VIEWPOINT
Having watched TV presenter Kate Garraway’s struggles with the care system, our columnist joins the call for urgent change
Ican’t say I was surprised to learn that poor Kate Garraway was left with debts of up to £1.5 million after nearly four years of caring for her husband Derek Draper.
Derek, as I’m sure you know, was one of the first to be devastated by long Covid.
He contracted Covid-19 in March 2020 and the sparky, loving husband and father I’d known as a younger man spent nearly a year in hospital as the virus ravaged his previously healthy body.
When he was discharged, still desperately ill, Kate had their home adapted to create a room for her immobile husband and determined to care for him herself. She carried on presenting Good Morning Britain and her radio show, buying in professional help. I’ve no doubt many assumed the bright, smiling, immaculately coiffed presenter must be earning millions and could afford to look after her husband. It’s not true.
I know only too well that the amounts paid to the likes of Gary Lineker are beyond rare. Derek’s care of £4,000 a week cost more than Kate’s salary. She could not afford to keep the heating on except in Derek’s room, and with two children to support as well as her husband she had to keep working – professionally and at home.
How she remained the bright, loving, patient woman we saw on the recent documentary, Derek’s Story, I cannot imagine, but Kate is not alone. According to Carers UK, there could be as many as 10.6 million – some adults, some children – caring for people they love. They are dealing with the stress, hard work and anxiety Kate has suffered and, like her, are receiving little help from the health services that promised to care for us from cradle to grave. As Kate says: ‘It’s meant to catch you if you fall. But actually, it feels like it’s trying to catch you out.’
None of this is new. In 2005 my mother was entering the last stages of Parkinson’s disease. My father, nearing 80, had valiantly cared for her for ten years, receiving a small carer’s allowance. It was not enough to hire in help when my mother’s needs became impossible for him to manage. She was doubly incontinent, unable to get herself to the bathroom and suffering from a bizarre form of dementia believed by the doctor to be caused by the Parkinson’s medication. It had become too hard for Dad to cope. My mother needed professional help.
She had to have a short stay in hospital to assess her mental state. Together with Dad, I asked t
