East Ayrshire Carers are calling for a celebration of carers across the region and beyond.

This week is National Carers Week and usually a series of events and activities would have been lined up for East Ayrshire carers by the group.

However, owing to COVID-19 these have had to be cancelled.

Fiona Robson, the co-chief executive for East Ayrshire Carers said: “During the global pandemic, more and more people are providing unpaid care to vulnerable people in our society and there has never been a more crucial time to recognise the enormous contribution that unpaid carers in East Ayrshire make every single day.

“Carers Week is going to look very different to us all this year. We have some small surprises lined up but more importantly we wanted to raise awareness of unpaid carers and highlight what East Ayrshire Carers are doing to provide ongoing advice, information and support.”

The theme of this year’s National Carers Week is “Making Caring Visible”.

Polling from YouGov estimates that 392,000 people in Scotland have become an unpaid carer as a result of COVID-19.

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