Queen Silvia in Germany

Queen Silvia was in western Germany over the weekend, to officially open a centre for dementia sufferers and to accept an award for her charity work.

On Friday March 16th, the Queen was in Bottorp, where she opened a centre to be used as a meeting place for people suffering from the first stages of dementia. The centre has been funded by the Malteser International group, and utilises the philosophy of the Silviahemmet (Silvia Home), which aims to provide support for dementia sufferers to allow them to be able to control their own lives.

The Queen, who founded the Silviahemmet in 1996 after witnessing her mother’s own struggle with dementia, said that she was “pleased and proud” to be able to open the first meeting place for dementia sufferers run by Malteser. Inside the centre, the Queen spoke with some of the first people to take advantage of the facility.

The following day, Queen Silvia attended the Steiger Awards at the Bochum Centennial Hall. She was presented with the Steiger Award in the charity division for her work to reduce the exploitation of children worldwide, which she highlighted in her speech: “250 million children must work every day. One percent of them, 2.5 million, below ground,” in reference to the Steiger Awards’ values, traditionally represented by miners – responsibility, honesty, openness and hard work.

The Steiger Awards, which translates to ‘The Miner’, presents the recipients with a statuette featuring a piece of coal inside a glass dome. Other recipients this year were German Federal President Horst Köhler, fashion designer Wolfgang Joop, German actress Christine Neubauer and US musician Lou Reed, who did not attend the ceremony due to illness.

Filed under Sweden
Tagged Awards, Children, Germany, Health, President Köhler of Germany, Queen Silvia of Sweden, Silviahemmet, Working Visit.

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