This report can do for family caregiving what the Surgeon General’s report did for smoking: elevate family caregiving issues to the national level meriting attention from individuals, families and policy makers.

It honors the reality that family caregivers are a silent army serving the nation by caring for loved ones, family by family and friend to friend.  If you aren’t a family caregiver now, you either have been a caregiver or will be one.

The Dole Foundation report makes it clear that all family caregivers could benefit from the kind of support accessible to post-911 family caregivers.

For our part, in service to family caregivers, AARP is engaged in a national education campaign with the Ad Council www.aarp.org/caregiving and a multi-state advocacy campaign to improve family caregiver support, training and workplace protections as well a national strategy to support family caregiverswww.aarp.org/SupportCaregivers. The AARP Public Policy Institute conducts policy research on family caregiving issues and convenes leading policy experts for discussion of national and state policies to better recognize and support caregiving families http://search.aarp.org/source/ppi/_/N-4gZ1z14009Z1z1404aZ49

CONTACT
Nancy Thompson
(202) 434-2560
nthompson@aarp.org