Mary, her real name, has 60 years and takes you from the 13 attending to her husband, 73, who suffers from senile dementia. His assignment to the day Centre the Association of Relatives of Alzheimer’s Patients (AFA) in Conil (Cadiz) in 2009, she ensured to be able to combine their working life with the care in the afternoons of your partner. When in 2012 he was awarded one of the squares arranged with the regional government of Andalusia in order to stay at the unit on weekends and public holidays until five in the afternoon, I was able to have a break during those hours. The regional ministry of Equality, Social Affairs and Reconciliation reported in late November that he would not renew the agreements with the centres of day of elderly with dependence and people with disabilities that recognize that service and that since the 31 of December of this year, removed all the seats, a decision that was ratified by letter the last day 12.
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These agreements were signed in 2009 and began as a pilot program, due to the good reception, it was extending on, even in the worst years of the economic crisis. All the centres have units of assistance daytime in the community are private and provide a good part of their services through the method of co-payment. The previous Administration warned that they were not going to extend these squares weekend and that they would be disappearing as the deaths of their holders. In the present 81 spaces, 59 for seniors and 22 for people with disabilities, remained active, according to data provided by the Board. The centers consulted, and the Association Forum of Andalusian Dependence (FADE), they understand that, despite the fact that those affected by the decision are not too many, the measure is an example of a cut in the policy Unit of the new andalusian Government.
In the letter, sent by the Agency for Social Services and Dependence of Andalusia to the 31 centers that maintained signed the agreements, explained that the weekend service and holidays “belongs to a pilot program that never came to be developed and that therefore it has no normative foundation that supports it”. “It could begin as a pilot program, but it takes 10 years, it is obvious that they are developed,” says this journal, the person responsible of a centre of the andalusian capital with 21 of the 22 spaces to serve disabled persons between 40 and 45 years of age during that period of time. The association which manages the centre does not want to publish his name because he is studying to take legal action against the department by insinuating that they have never provided that service. “The Administration is in their perfect right not to renew the addendum, but you can’t say that the program has not been run” impact. The family have written a letter to the Board expressing his anguish and upset by a decision so abrupt.
The agreements signed by the Board with the centres of day care to seniors and persons with disabilities established a model of co-equal for all, confirm sources close to the general direction of the launched in your time. For the case of the first, the Board provided 37 euros per day and the particular 11,8, in accordance with the agreement signed with AFA Conil. In the case of the association that serves patients with disabilities, the Administration assumed the payment of 80 euros. The ministry of Equality has not been provided to this newspaper an amount of concrete of the total cost of this service, but by a calculation of the weekends and 14 days public holidays a year which stipulates the working calendar in Spanish with the data provided by the above mentioned centers, the number rises to 465.274 euros per year.
“beyond these hours I don’t have a life of its own”
“it’s no longer for these centers, which are funded largely through charities, the loss of this amount would entail the impossibility of being able to continue to provide the service on our own, is that patients don’t understand weekends or holidays, and for them the routine is vital”, explains Rosario Rodriguez, director of AFA Conil. In the center came to have 30 places for concerted and now there are only four, one from 2009 and three from 2012, one of them the husband of Mary. “He has already lost the power of speech, but if we do not take them to the center, its hours, going by the door alone,” he insists Mary. For her, the attention she receives her husband every Saturday from 10 in the morning until five in the afternoon is a relief. “Beyond those hours I don’t have a life of its own”, acknowledges, illustrating the relief that that provision means in their day-to-day. In the center of seville you will hear the background christmas carols that users are singing during a christmas party. The funds received thanks to the concert allowed them to pay the salary of the eight people necessary to direct attention. “Without this support, we have to do without the service”, he laments his responsibility.
Many of the schools affected have asked for explanations from the Agency for Social Services and Dependency, but I have been given an appointment for after the 1st of January, when it will be effective to the paralysis of the convention. In the e-mail they were suggested to offer to families the service of relative respite, but that provision does not address the needs of those who live with the owners of the squares. “For access is required to comply with specific requirements and is created for the case that those who serve the dependents take a vacation. The philosophy was that there was more than a month and involves in addition an income of 24 hours, when these families want to be with their relatives,” points out Nuria Hernandez, general secretary of FADE.
Mary has a minimal hope that at the last moment to keep the service. Has asked for our help, through AFA Conil the spokespersons for municipal of the town in search of a solution. The group UI will take you to the full next week. From the center of Seville have received the support of the PSOE and Ahead of Andalusia, which will ask in the regional Parliament for the abolition of the service.
