Stenness man encourages those living with MS to seek help during awareness week

A Stenness man living with multiple sclerosis (MS) has urged folk to open up and take solace from others as they get to grips with living with the debilitating condition.

Speaking to The Orcadian in the same week the Orkney community has thrown its backing behind MS Awareness Week, Allan Jamieson says the help and support of the MS Society and the MS Therapy Centre can be crucial in retaining a positive outlook and managing a condition which, at present, has no cure.

“It helps you keep things in perspective,” said Allan, 43, who was diagnosed as having MS in 2016. “It helps you to not worry or panic about the future, because it is reassuring speaking to other people who have been dealing with this for years.”

The scale of MS in Orkney is unprecedented, baffling researchers and experts and leading to the county being described as the MS capital of the world. Nationally, the condition affects around 11,000 people.

Orkney has the highest instance of MS in the world, with a 2012 study revealing that the rate for probable or definite MS was 402 per 100,000 people — compared to 209 in Scotland and 167 in the UK.

Read more in this week’s The Orcadian.