Bernadette Dalmar is not one to spare her efforts. This 74-year-old Thionvilloise nevertheless suffers from asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). “Asthma is when the bronchial tubes tighten up and the air no longer passes,” she popularizes. Bernadette has been campaigning for nearly 30 years to inform the general public about these issues. She knows the right words.
She created the VAIR association, Living with asthma and respiratory failure in Nord Lorraine , in 1995 with two doctors, Beauregard’s head of pneumology Alain Béraud and retired Michel Simon. “At the time, asthma caused the death of 2,500 people a year,” recalls Bernadette Dalmar. She lived on oxygen for years, she chained hospital stays, intubated, ventilated.
Her fragility did not prevent her from investing herself body and soul. She chaired the association for twenty years. She hosted conferences throughout the region, held stands in hospitals, schools, pharmacies, stores to screen, raise awareness, prevent. VAIR had nearly 70 members at its peak.
“I am a whole person,” admits Bernadette with a smile. Her frail silhouette does not stay in place. This little piece of woman lights up as soon as she talks about her association, the actions carried out, the incalculable number of people she has met, advised, reassured. “I was thanked a lot,” she slips, moved. “But I’ve always done it with a lot of sincerity,” she insists.
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Humor and pedagogy
Her throat knots, her eyes squint when she talks about the end of this adventure. Because the association has just been dissolved in June. The health crisis and the absence of a solid succession within the committee have stifled goodwill.
Bernadette Dalmar is a fighter. However, his health no longer allows him to continue. At least not as she would like. The epidemic rebounds of the Covid and the transmission of the virus by aerosols do not help matters. Because the president has always made people, young and old, breathe to establish her diagnosis. A whole technique that she handles with humor. She used a flow meter to assess their breathing capacities.
His house contains a plethora of brochures, magazine clippings, photos, materials, files on asthma and other similar pathologies. The association may have run out of air. But its historic president says she is ready to pass on her experience to anyone interested in the subject. She wants to infuse what she knows.
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