At the end of March ADI Membership Manager, Gloria Mantineo travelled to South Africa to visit the country member association ADASA, meeting with CEO, Marlene Freislich and regional leadership team.
Gloria joined Marlene to travel to KwaZulu-Natal (KZN), first visiting the Twilanga care centre in Durban to meet with the regional management and team responsible for providing training, family consultations, support groups, prison awareness projects and community development. While in KZN, Gloria also met with traditional healers who are participating in an ADASA pilot project aimed at increasing understanding of dementia. Given the invaluable role traditional healers have in their communities, this collaboration holds great potential to raise awareness and combat the stigma surrounding dementia, especially in rural areas where access to formal healthcare may be limited. From KwaZulu-Natal, the next stop was Cape Town, to meet the Western Cape regional team. On the final stop of her visit, Gloria visited a community centre in Atteridgeville near Pretoria, Gauteng.
Gloria has said:
I am deeply grateful for the opportunity to join Marlene in visiting several of the many regional offices that ADASA holds across South Africa. It has been truly inspiring to witness the dedication and the fantastic work being done by the association to support people living with dementia and their carers. Their commitment to addressing challenges and pioneering solutions is remarkable, and I sincerely appreciate the warm welcome and insights shared during my visit.
The regional visits highlight the broad scope of dementia care provision and advocacy work undertaken by ADASA in a culturally diverse country with 11 official languages, with some languages such as Afrikaans and English becoming less prevalent according to the 2022 Census.
Learn about Association for Dementia and Alzheimer’s of South Africa
Marlene said:
We at ADASA are truly honoured to have hosted this visit and it has been wonderful to share with Gloria the work we are doing across South Africa. It has been a great opportunity to exchange insights, highlight the challenges we face and showcase the innovative approaches we are developing to reach and support people living with dementia and their carers. We deeply appreciate the engagement with ADI and look forward to continued collaboration in raising awareness and improving care.
In the next 15 years, dementia will become the 9th leading cause of death in South Africa, and by 2050, the number of people living with dementia is forecast to rise to at least 680,000. In the sub-Saharan region of Africa, the number of people living with dementia is expected 7.62 million by 2050.
Read ADI’s report on Dementia in the sub-Saharan region
ADI looks forward to seeing further developments in South Africa as they show leadership in dementia advocacy and care the sub-Saharan African region.