This year's Dying Matters Awareness Week (16-22 May) reveals that although the majority of people think that talking about death is less of a taboo than it was 20 years ago, two thirds of Brits think that people in the UK are not comfortable discussing dying and death. Someone in Britain dies every minute, yet death remains a taboo subject.

More people are scared of dying in pain (83%) than of being told they are dying (67%), dying alone (62%) or dying in hospital (59%). Despite the economic downturn more people are scared of dying than of going bankrupt (41%) or losing their job (38%). More than half of people agree that if we felt more comfortable talking about dying and death, people would be less likely to die alone. The majority of people (around 70%) would prefer to die at home, but around 60% die in hospital – in many cases unnecessarily.

Most people have not discussed key issues around dying and death with their parents, partner or close friends. Few people have discussed with their partner the type of funeral they want (33%), whether they have a will (33%) where they would like to die (16%) or the type of care and support they would want at the end of their lives (18%). Only 11% of people had discussed where they would like to die with their parents. Yet it is clearly an important decision, with 78% of people thinking it is part of a health professional’s job to talk about where someone would like to be cared for when dying and how they would like to die.