Les femmes seules en hausse

Cet article de Steve Doughty, publié dans le Daily Mail, rappelle que le nombre de femmes seules en âge de travailler augmente.

Cette évolution statistique n'est pas sans conséquences pour le levage de fonds.

Une femme seule qui gagne sa vie est bien plus susceptible de répondre à des appels charitables et de donner du temps au titre du bénévolat.


The Bridget Jones generation: How half of women aged 18-35 are living alone

Trend: Fewer than half of young women now share their lives with a man - just like movie singleton Bridget Jones
Fewer than half of young women now share their lives with a man, researchers said yesterday.
Some, like movie singleton Bridget Jones, live alone while others are forced by the high cost of housing to remain with their parents.
A study shows that just over half of all women aged between 18 and 34 – 50.8 per cent – do not live with a partner.
The single majority reflects a big increase in the numbers who either by choice or necessity live with their parents, who have put their career before relationships, or have become lone mothers.
Less than 30 years ago well over half the women in the same age group were married, and around two thirds were living full-time with either a husband or boyfriend.
The figures were compiled by the European Union’s Eurostat statistics arm from figures collected from across EU countries by Brussels.
They also showed more than six out of ten men in the same age group are on their own – although men have always married or taken live-in partners at an older age than women.
In Britain the rise of singledom is partly a product of university or higher education for greater numbers of girls, together with far more opportunities for well-paid careers for young women.
However, the high cost of housing is also persuading many to stay at home with their parents.
It may also be that well-educated and well-paid young women are far more choosy about the qualities of the men they may pick as partners. Among less well-off young women, the ‘couple penalty’ built into the benefits system discourages the forming of partnerships.
Single mothers can lose as much as £200 a week in benefits and tax credits if they live with their child’s father or another man, and British official statistics have shown there are 1.2million couples who keep separate homes and regard themselves as ‘living apart together’.
Researcher and author on family life Patricia Morgan said: ‘We are always told the single life is exciting, but these figures hide a lot of dissatisfaction and a lot of heartbreak. The number of women who want to be married and to have a family is very high.
‘There is a squeeze on women at both ends of the income range. At the bottom the benefits system stops them finding partners. Higher up it is hard to afford somewhere to live and there is no tax help for couples. The Child Benefit changes are hardly going to help.’

True reflection: A Scene from the film 'Bridget Jones: The Edge Of Reason' starring Renee Zellweger as Bridget - today 50.8 per cent of women aged 18-35 do not live with a partner
There is no equivalent in figures collected for the British government to the percentage for those ‘living in a consensual union’ that have been published for the first time by the EU.
However in 1981, according to counts by the Office for National Statistics, 53 per cent of women in England and Wales aged between 16 and 34, some 3.7million young women, were married.
Since teenagers aged between 16 and 18 were the least likely to be married, the percentage among 18 to 34 year olds would have been higher.
A further 10 per cent of women in the same age group are thought to have been cohabiting. Mealtimes have been one of the traditions that have suffered as more people live alone.
Almost three-quarters of Britons no longer have three meals a day, with snacking becoming the preferred form of eating.
Half of Britons admitted they snacked because they were bored, with almost a quarter describing themselves as emotional eaters who nibble when sad and stressed, the survey for food company Feasters found.
One in ten said they snacked because they were too busy to prepare a meal and 72 per cent said they never ate three meals a day.
Feasters boss Nicola O’Dwyer said: ‘Today’s generation appear to prefer quick, convenient snacks over preparing a meal.
‘This is far from surprising when you consider hectic work schedules, social lives and other activities, which fill up the day.’

Le fund raising sert-il à quelque chose ?

Jolie histoire signée par Jenny Hope ce matin dans le Daily Mail. Un médicament va finalement être mis à la disposition des malades britanniques d'Alzheimer grâce à une campagne lancée par ce quotidien et à l'argent recolté auprès des lecteurs. De quoi inspirer bien des associations et des marketers.

Alzheimer's victory: After three-year campaign by the Mail, sufferers will finally get vital £2.50 drugs banned by NICE

Hundreds of thousands of people in the early stages of Alzheimer’s will no longer be denied crucial drugs that slow the devastating disease.

A three-year campaign by the Daily Mail ended in victory yesterday when the NHS drug rationing body reversed a ban that had been universally condemned by doctors, patients and their families.
Patients diagnosed with Alzheimer’s - who knew they were losing their minds - faced the scandalous situation of waiting for their condition to deteriorate before being prescribed the three drugs.

'It's wonderful': Alzheimer's sufferer Derek Quinn, pictured with wife Teresa, said he will 'now be able to do something positive'. Read his full story below
Aricept, Exelon and Reminyl cost only £2.50 a day, but the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence ruled in 2007 that they can be used only by patients in moderate - not early - stages of the disease.

This prompted a legal challenge partly funded by £230,000 raised in one week by Mail readers, which forced NICE to reveal its calculations behind banning the drugs.
Now the rationing body has succumbed to pressure and issued new draft guidelines which will allow doctors to prescribe the treatments to patients with mild symptoms.
The U-turn also means the drug Ebixa can be prescribed for the first time to severely ill patients. This will save thousands from taking antipsychotic medication – dubbed the ‘chemical cosh’ – which is not proven to work and can cause dangerous side-effects such as strokes.

The Mail campaigned vigorously with the Alzheimer’s Society, and with the help of physicians and celebrities, to end the scandal which affected some of the most vulnerable in our society.
Although the drugs are not a cure, up to half of patients respond with ‘life-changing’ improvements. Their symptoms are lessened and the progression to dementia is slowed, trials have proven.
Research also shows that those who begin the drug treatment at a later stage never catch up with those who began earlier, suggesting prompt intervention leads to an improved long-term prognosis.
Nice previously claimed the NHS could not afford to offer drugs to all eligible patients, but has now carried out a review using a different computer model to assess their cost-effectiveness.
This time it concludes the benefits are worthwhile, when compared with full-time care which can cost up to £40,000 a year.
Enlarge
The change in policy could be confirmed early next year in England and Wales, where the ban applies.
The potential cost to the NHS is unclear because thousands of patients could now ask for re-assessment, to add to the newly diagnosed.
At present the NHS spends around £100million a year on anti-dementia drugs. A Government estimate says using Aricept for mild disease would add only £5.7million next year. It says this would be offset by delays in patients needing long-term care.
And the drug will lose its patent in 2012 which means the price will fall as cheaper generics are supplied to the NHS.
Professor Clive Ballard, director of research at the Alzheimer’s Society, said doctors had faced an ethical dilemma for the past three years: Knowing there was treatment available that they were banned from prescribing.
He said: ‘If this guidance is issued, doctors will no longer have to watch people deteriorate without being able to treat them.’
Professor Ballard is convinced some doctors had been reluctant to diagnose the disease because of the restrictions, while patients might also have delayed seeking help.
He paid tribute to the Mail readers who raised £230,000 towards the court battle, which failed to overturn the ban but forced Nice to disclose key information.

Thanking Mail readers, Ruth Sutherland, interim chief executive of the Alzheimer’s Society, said: ‘In 2007 thousands of people supported our campaign to get access to Alzheimer’s drugs. We would like to say thank you to each and every one of these people for their support.
‘People with dementia tell us that taking the drug treatments can be like a fog lifting.
For the price of a cup of coffee these drugs can help many people continue to play with their grandchildren or recognise their loved ones. You can’t put a value on these benefits.’ Gordon Wilcock, professor of clinical geratology at Oxford University, said ‘common sense’ had prevailed and NHS patients would at last get help – not just those who could afford a private prescription.
Nice’s chief executive, Sir Andrew Dillon, said: ‘Our increased confidence in the benefits and costs associated with the use of the three drugs for treating mild and moderate stages of the disease has enabled us to make a positive recommendation for their use in mild disease.’
Drugs that 'lift the fog'
Fewer than one in ten Alzheimer’s patients are prescribed anti-dementia drugs to treat their symptoms, yet clinical trials clearly show the benefits of early treatment.
Aricept, Exelon and Reminyl compensate for low levels of a key chemical in the brain.
They stop breakdown of the enzyme acetylcholinerase, which plays a crucial role in memory and helps nerve cells communicate.
When they work the drugs ‘lift the fog’ for patients who remember names, or how to make a cup of tea, with effects lasting up to two years on average. Aricept, which costs £75 a month, is the most popular.
Another, Ebixa, at £69 a month, has never before been recommended for routine use on the NHS. It is the first in a new class of drugs which appear to have a protective effect, by blocking a messenger chemical that increases damage to brain cells.
A long-term study found Ebixa restored the ability, for at least a year, of severely ill patients to do routine daily activities and feel more alert.
In the U.S. and France, clinicians routinely combine a drug such as Aricept with Ebixa to get maximum protection for patients.

The 63-year-old chartered surveyor was diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer’s in 2000 and was prescribed the drug before Nice changed its guidance.
His wife and carer Mary, 67, said: ‘He was going downhill fast, but Aricept returned things almost to normal. It gave us four to five years of normal life, in which we managed to do things together which we knew we wouldn’t be able to do later.’
Mr Stevenson, from Ambleside, Cumbria, was even able to give away three of his daughters at their weddings. Sadly, his condition has since deteriorated and he is now needs full-time care in a residential home.
This is the news we have waited so long for
When Derek Quinn, 69, pictured earlier, was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s two years ago, he was told there were no drugs to help.
He was in the early stages of the disease when, under the old NHS guidelines, drugs were banned until his condition worsened.
He sought help after suffering memory lapses working at the wood recycling company where he was co-director.
‘I found I couldn’t recognise customers I’d been serving just a week before,’ he said.
His wife Teresa, 66, says they both felt let down by the NHS after months of worry.
She said: ‘We went to the memory clinic where the diagnosis was confirmed but the doctors said they couldn’t prescribe anything at this stage. It was quite a blow to be told there was nothing they could do. It took a lot of getting used to.
‘Derek wanted to take Aricept and they turned him down, and he tried again a few months later. The doctors said they would have to make a special case and so we accepted he wasn’t going to get it.’
The couple, who have six children and live in Calne, Wiltshire, will now ask again for Aricept.
Mrs Quinn said: ‘It’s great that we’ll get the chance. We appreciate it might not work but Derek would like the opportunity to try it.’
Mr Quinn said: ‘It’s wonderful that I might now be able to do something positive.’

Le Daily Mail nous rappelle que le niveau apparent de richesse n'est pas toujours l'indicateur d'une absence de fortune.



The £1.4m man: Amazing fortune of widower who owned just one suit, got by on £5 a week... and left a fortune to animal charities

Wearing the same old suit day in, day out, he couldn’t have looked less like a millionaire. But when Gordon Hardy died at 83, it turned out he wasn’t quite the poverty-stricken pensioner he had appeared to be.
The retired civil servant and his wife Jean, who died in 2008, did not have any children. And decades of saving and sensible investments had left the couple remarkably well-off.
However, it was only after Mr Hardy’s death that it emerged he was worth £1.4million.
Their solicitor, Lyndsey McHale, was the only person aware of the couple’s wealth.
Yesterday, she said: ‘Mr Hardy was a real gentleman, modest and old-fashioned, and you would never have guessed he was worth over £1million.
‘He always wore the same suit, and when he had to move into a nursing home it turned out they were the only clothes he owned.

Gordon Hardy and his wife lived a simple life, only owned one suit, and lived on £5 a week
‘I couldn’t believe it the first time he showed me the paper work about all the investments they had, but he just wasn’t interested in spending it.’
The couple, who were animal lovers, are believed to have worked in Derbyshire, where Mrs Hardy was a postmistress, before retiring to a bungalow in the seaside resort of Southport, Merseyside.

They wanted their estate to be split between three animal charities: the PDSA, the Blue Cross and the Donkey Sanctuary.

Neighbour Maureen Taylor, 60, said: ‘There were no signs at all that they had so much money.
'Jean was always out walking their poodle, Bobby, and I suppose they decided they wanted the money to help care for animals after they were gone.’
In 2006, they sold the bungalow for £250,000 and moved into sheltered accommodation, taking with them their collection of antiques, including a grandfather clock worth £4,000.
After Mrs Hardy died, her husband came to see their solicitor, a specialist in wills and probate at Brown Turner Ross.
‘He said his wife had always done the finances and gave me a scrap of paper with details of their savings on.
‘My first thought was, “That can’t be right!”, but it was all there – various bank and building society accounts plus a lot in National Savings certificates.
‘How it was built up we don’t know, but it seems they were just very careful with money.
‘I would always ask him if he wanted to buy anything or go anywhere and he would always say the same thing, “What do I need to spend money on?”.

Gordon and his wife sold their bungalow and moved into sheltered accommodation in later life
‘Later on he asked for £20 a month of which around £9 was for his electricity bills.’

Mr Hardy died in February. His solicitor added: ‘Sadly he never really recovered from his wife’s death, but at least their wealth will now go to benefit the causes they supported.’