essay on disability is a state of mind

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The Dignity of Disabled Lives

The burden of being perceived as different persists. The solution to this problem is community.

By Andrew Solomon

Mr. Solomon is a professor of clinical psychology at Columbia University and the author of “ Far From the Tree ,” which has been made into a documentary film .

This essay is adapted from the author’s foreword to the new book “ About Us: Essays From The New York Times Disability Series .”

The eugenic movement spearheaded by Francis Galton in England in the late Victorian period reached a culmination in the view that if you got rid of the misfits, you could breed a pure, advantaged race. The reach of the movement was reflected in the American campaigns to sterilize disabled people, supported in a 1927 Supreme Court decision in which Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote, “It is better for all the world, if instead of waiting to execute degenerate offspring for crime, or to let them starve for their imbecility, society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind. Three generations of imbeciles are enough.”

Drawing on these sources, Hitler began his campaigns of genocide by gassing the disabled, presuming not only that they were polluting the larger population, but also that they were a group no one would miss. Genetic determinism presumed that the weak and disadvantaged passed along their weakness and disadvantage, and that a systematic campaign of eliminating all but the best and strongest could improve the lot of humanity.

There are two entwined arguments here, one about who makes disabled children, and the other about the worth of the lives of those disabled children. What sort of parents have children with disabilities? Every sort of parent. Nondisabled parents produce disabled children with startling regularity — and disabled people produce nondisabled children time and again. So that part of the argument is specious, at least when applied so specifically as Galton, Holmes and Hitler contemplated. More relevant to us today is the modern argument that whether disability is passed along generationally or not, it has inherent worth, and the loss of it from our society would be a troubling depletion of human diversity. That is a more radical, philosophical challenge.

Disabled lives are lives, and are charged with inherent dignity. Most people with disabilities don’t wish they had never been born; most people with disabilities contribute to the world they inhabit; most people with disabilities both give more to and get more from life than their nondisabled peers may be inclined to guess. Some have rich lives despite their disability, but others would say they have rich lives at least in part because of their disability.

In 1968, the ethicist Joseph Fletcher wrote in The Atlantic Monthly, that esteemed journal of liberal thought, that there was “no reason to feel guilty about putting a Down’s syndrome baby away, whether it’s ‘put away’ in the sense of hidden in a sanatorium or in a more responsible lethal sense. It is sad, yes. Dreadful. But it carries no guilt. True guilt arises only from an offense against a person, and a Down’s is not a person.”

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Book Reviews

In 2 essay collections, writers with disabilities tell their own stories.

Ilana Masad

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More than 1 in 5 people living in the U.S. has a disability, making it the largest minority group in the country.

Despite the civil rights law that makes it illegal to discriminate against a person based on disability status — Americans with Disabilities Act passed in 1990 — only 40 percent of disabled adults in what the Brookings Institute calls "prime working age," that is 25-54, are employed. That percentage is almost doubled for non-disabled adults of the same age. But even beyond the workforce — which tends to be the prime category according to which we define useful citizenship in the U.S. — the fact is that people with disabilities (or who are disabled — the language is, for some, interchangeable, while others have strong rhetorical and political preferences), experience a whole host of societal stigmas that range from pity to disbelief to mockery to infantilization to fetishization to forced sterilization and more.

But disabled people have always existed, and in two recent essay anthologies, writers with disabilities prove that it is the reactions, attitudes, and systems of our society which are harmful, far more than anything their own bodies throw at them.

About Us: Essays from the Disability Series of the New York Times, edited by Peter Catapano and Rosemarie Garland-Thomson, collects around 60 essays from the column, which began in 2016, and divides them into eight self-explanatory sections: Justice, Belonging, Working, Navigating, Coping, Love, Family, and Joy. The title, which comes from the 1990s disability rights activist slogan "Nothing about us without us," explains the book's purpose: to give those with disabilities the platform and space to write about their own experiences rather than be written about.

While uniformly brief, the essays vary widely in terms of tone and topic. Some pieces examine particular historical horrors in which disability was equated with inhumanity, like the "The Nazis' First Victims Were the Disabled" by Kenny Fries (the title says it all) or "Where All Bodies Are Exquisite" by Riva Lehrer, in which Lehrer, who was born with spina bifida in 1958, "just as surgeons found a way to close the spina bifida lesion," visits the Mutter Museum in Philadelphia. There, she writes:

"I am confronted with a large case full of specimen jars. Each jar contains a late-term fetus, and all of the fetuses have the same disability: Their spinal column failed to fuse all the way around their spinal cord, leaving holes (called lesions) in their spine. [...] I stand in front of these tiny humans and try not to pass out. I have never seen what I looked like on the day I was born."

Later, she adds, "I could easily have ended up as a teaching specimen in a jar. But luck gave me a surgeon."

Other essays express the joys to be found in experiences unfamiliar to non-disabled people, such as the pair of essays by Molly McCully Brown and Susannah Nevison in which the two writers and friends describe the comfort and intimacy between them because of shared — if different — experiences; Brown writes at the end of her piece:

"We're talking about our bodies, and then not about our bodies, about her dog, and my classes, and the zip line we'd like to string between us [... a]nd then we're talking about our bodies again, that sense of being both separate and not separate from the skin we're in. And it hits me all at once that none of this is in translation, none of this is explaining. "

From the cover of Resistance and Hope: Essays by Disabled People, edited by Alice Wong Disability Visibility Project hide caption

From the cover of Resistance and Hope: Essays by Disabled People, edited by Alice Wong

While there's something of value in each of these essays, partially because they don't toe to a single party line but rather explore the nuances of various disabilities, there's an unfortunate dearth of writers with intellectual disabilities in this collection. I also noticed that certain sections focused more on people who've acquired a disability during their lifetime and thus went through a process of mourning, coming to terms with, or overcoming their new conditions. While it's true — and emphasized more than once — that many of us, as we age, will become disabled, the process of normalization must begin far earlier if we're to become a society that doesn't discriminate against or segregate people with disabilities.

One of the contributors to About Us, disability activist and writer Alice Wong, edited and published another anthology just last year, Resistance and Hope: Essays by Disabled People , through the Disability Visibility Project which publishes and supports disability media and is partnered with StoryCorps. The e-book, which is available in various accessible formats, features 17 physically and/or intellectually disabled writers considering the ways in which resistance and hope intersect. And they do — and must, many of these writers argue — intersect, for without a hope for a better future, there would be no point to such resistance. Attorney and disability justice activist Shain M. Neumeir writes:

"Those us who've chosen a life of advocacy and activism aren't hiding from the world in a bubble as the alt-right and many others accuse us of doing. Anything but. Instead, we've chosen to go back into the fires that forged us, again and again, to pull the rest of us out, and to eventually put the fires out altogether."

You don't go back into a burning building unless you hope to find someone inside that is still alive.

The anthology covers a range of topics: There are clear and necessary explainers — like disability justice advocate and organizer Lydia X. Z. Brown's "Rebel — Don't Be Palatable: Resisting Co-optation and Fighting for the World We Want" — about what disability justice means, how we work towards it, and where such movements must resist both the pressures of systemic attacks (such as the threatened cuts to coverage expanded by the Affordable Care Act) and internal gatekeeping and horizontal oppression (such as a community member being silenced due to an unpopular or uninformed opinion). There are essays that involve the work of teaching towards a better future, such as community lawyer Talila A. Lewis's "the birth of resistance: courageous dreams, powerful nobodies & revolutionary madness" which opens with a creative classroom writing prompt: "The year is 2050. There are no prisons. What does justice look like?" And there are, too, personal meditations on what resistance looks like for people who don't always have the mobility or ability to march in the streets or confront their lawmakers in person, as Ojibwe writer Mari Kurisato explains:

"My resistance comes from who I am as a Native and as an LGBTQIA woman. Instinctively, the first step is reaching out and making connections across social media and MMO [massively multiplayer online] games, the only places where my social anxiety lets me interact with people on any meaningful level."

The authors of these essays mostly have a clear activist bent, and are working, lauded, active people; they are gracious, vivid parts of society. Editor Alice Wong demonstrates her own commitments in the diversity of these writers' lived experiences: they are people of color and Native folk, they encompass the LGBTQIA+ spectrum, they come from different class backgrounds, and their disabilities range widely. They are also incredibly hopeful: Their commitment to disability justice comes despite many being multiply marginalized. Artist and poet Noemi Martinez, who is queer, chronically ill, and a first generation American, writes that "Not all communities are behind me and my varied identities, but I defend, fight, and work for the rights of the members of all my communities." It cannot be easy to fight for those who oppress parts of you, and yet this is part of Martinez's commitment.

While people with disabilities have long been subjected to serve as "inspirations" for the non-disabled, this anthology's purpose is not to succumb to this gaze, even though its authors' drive, creativity, and true commitment to justice and reform is apparent. Instead, these essays are meant to spur disabled and non-disabled people alike into action, to remind us that even if we can't see the end result, it is the fight for equality and better conditions for us all that is worth it. As activist and MFA student Aleksei Valentin writes:

"Inspiration doesn't come first. Even hope doesn't come first. Action comes first. As we act, as we speak, as we resist, we find our inspiration, our hope, that which helps us inspire others and keep moving forward, no matter the setbacks and no matter the defeats."

Ilana Masad is an Israeli American fiction writer, critic and founder/host of the podcast The Other Stories . Her debut novel, All My Mother's Lovers, is forthcoming from Dutton in 2020.

Home         About the Author         Key Documents         Accessibility

• There Oughta’ Be A Law: Discriminatory Short-Circuit of Summer Job
• There Oughta’ Be a Law: The Bob Brunner Story
• A Dozen Things to Know About the ADA
• Who Really Wrote the ADA?
• Landmark Education Rights Precedent: The Gail H. Story
• Cross-Country Wheelchair Trek and Statue of Liberty Accessibility
• Tom Gilhool and Me
• Disability, Pandemic, and Discrimination: People With Disabilities Shafted Again
• Early Years with a Disability
• Family Background and the Gray Period
• Disability Rights Movement
• To the National Council
• Toward Independence and the Vision of an ADA
• Prelude to Drafting the Original ADA Bill
• Drafting and Introduction of the Original ADA Bill
• ADA 1990 & Beyond

DISABILITY, PANDEMIC, AND DISCRIMINATION: PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES SHAFTED AGAIN

This essay identifies a number of ways in which measures to address the COVID-19 pandemic have shafted persons with disabilities, and analyzes how and why people with disabilities were shortchanged. As all Americans and all agencies of government and the private sector do their parts to end the pandemic and get the country back on its feet, they must do so in a way that ensures equal justice and avoids discrimination against people with disabilities. Doing so involves two interrelated components: (1) Recognizing and putting into action certain fundamental principles about fair and humane treatment of people with disabilities; and (2) Operationalizing policies and measures addressing the COVID-19 crisis to reflect the needs and respect the human and legal rights of people with disabilities.

By Robert L. Burgdorf Jr.

March 19, 2021

With special thanks to my daughter Molly Burgdorf, a disability advocate, lawyer, and a woman with a disability, whose generous input and ideas were integral to  the conceptualization and substance of this essay.

On March, 18, 2020, less than a week after the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the COVID-19 outbreak a pandemic, the National Council on Disability (NCD) issued this warning:

[P]eople with chronic illnesses and other disabilities have been left behind, denied resources to survive, and as a result, have suffered great losses of life because of lack of emergency preparation that respects every life, and by outright discrimination by medical practitioners who, through ignorance of the law or due to the belief that people with disabilities are less valuable, and therefore less deserving of medical care, than those who are not. Such prejudice has fed into the belief that people with disabilities, especially the most weak and vulnerable, should be put out of their misery. NCD opposes these views and any medical actions that implicitly and explicitly disregard the dignity of the lives of people with disabilities. These beliefs have always been dangerous – but COVID-19 raises NCD’s concerns to an unprecedented level. [1]

Mistreatment, marginalization, and even annihilation of people with disabilities are nothing new.

The history of society’s formal methods for dealing with [people with disabilities] can be summed up in two words: segregation and inequality. Individuals with [disabilities] have faced an almost universal conspiracy to shunt them aside from the mainstream of society and to deny them an equal share of benefits and opportunities available to others. [2]

Since the enactment of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) in 1990, public awareness and recognition of the legal and human rights of people with disabilities have been growing. The ADA was widely heralded as ending “second-class citizenship” of people with disabilities. With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, such high hopes and positive trends have been undercut by disregard for and maltreatment of people with disabilities in many of the programs, practices, rules, and policies government and private agencies have developed in response to COVID-19.

The COVID-19 pandemic has injured and killed all kinds of people. As of this writing, some 119,000,000 cases and over 2,600,000 deaths have occurred worldwide, with more than 29,000,000 cases and nearly 530,000 deaths in the United States; and untold numbers of people are suffering ongoing, harmful after-effects of the virus. Unquestionably, some parts of society – including Black people, Latinx people, indigenous people, older adults, poor people, health-care workers, L.G.B.T.Q.I.A.+ people, and prisoners and detainees – have been hit particularly hard.

The virus has also slammed people with disabilities. In February 2021, American broadcast journalist Amy Goodman hosted an episode of her Democracy Now! television and radio program that featured a panel of disability activists describing the brutal consequences of discrimination on the basis of disability in the face of the pandemic. Goodman began the segment by recognizing the “devastating impact” that the COVID-19 pandemic has had on people with disabilities, noting that they “are two to three times more likely to die from COVID.” [3]

Yet, too often people with disabilities are inappropriately excluded, ignored, or treated badly in procedures and policies deployed to address the virus. The purpose of this essay is to shed light on and analyze why and how COVID measures have severely shortchanged persons with disabilities.

The following outline summarizes major topics:

I.  COVID-19 Is Ultra Harmful to People with Disabilities

• Because of Increased Medical Vulnerability
• Because of Discrimination and Bias by Medical Personnel
• Based on Other Systemic Inequities that Predated the Pandemic

II.  COVID-19 Measures and Policies Discriminate Against People with Disabilities

• Discrimination in the Allocation of Treatment and Services
• Delay and Failures in Addressing Congregate Settings Issues
• Woefully Inadequate Data Collection
• Absence of Needed Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)
• Inadequacies in COVID Testing Programs
• Inequities, Confusion, and Frustration in Vaccine Allocation for People with Disabilities
• Devalued Vaccination Status of Children and Adolescents

III.  Recent Developments and Current Status

• Progress in Dealing with the COVID-19 Pandemic
• Ongoing Flaws and Problems for People with Disabilities in COVID-19 Pandemic Efforts
• Much More Needs to Be Done to Achieve Equal Access to Medical Equipment, Services, Facilities, Treatment, and Vaccinations

IV.  Going Forward from Here

• Fundamental Guiding Principles
• Rectifying COVID-19 Policy and Practice Shortcomings

A. Because of Increased Medical Vulnerability

• Heightened Susceptibility to COVID-19 of People with Disabilities

People with disabilities are at greater risk of severe illness or death from COVID-19. CDC (the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) has published lists of some medical conditions that cause increased risk for being infected and for severe illness or death from the virus. [4]   As one disability activist aptly observed: “Studies show that people with disabilities who contract the virus are much more likely to die from it. … The science says people with disabilities are disproportionately dying of COVID.” [5]   Moreover, aside from medical conditions, a significant proportion of the population with disabilities are themselves Black, Latinx, indigenous, older, unemployed, poor, homeless, L.G.B.T.Q.I.A.+, of higher weight, essential workers, or members of other groups that are at high risk from COVID infection. Having more than one risk factor for contracting the coronavirus and suffering serious consequences from it exponentially multiplies the perils for people with disabilities. It also makes such people prone to what has been termed “intersectional discrimination,” a double-dose of discriminatory treatment based on their overlapping identities or circumstances. [6]

B. Because of Discrimination and Bias by Medical Personnel

• Bias Against People with Disabilities

We people with disabilities are well aware that we often get short shrift in society. In a 1997 report, the National Council on Disability (NCD) observed that “[o]ne of the hallmarks of societal attitudes toward disabilities has been a tendency of people without disabilities to overestimate the negative aspects and underestimate the positive features of the lives of those who have disabilities.” [7]   NCD added that the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights described the negative connotations of disability as “extremely extensive”: “To the fact that a [person with a disability] differs from the norm physically or mentally, people often add a value judgment that such a difference is a big and very negative one.” [8]   It is not surprising that some such misguided attitudes and biased thinking regularly infect the health care industry. In the 1997 report, NCD gave a big tip of the hat to medical professionals:

Many people with disabilities have been great beneficiaries of the miracles of modern medicine. Some owe their very lives and others much of their ability to function to the medical profession. Lifesaving treatments, rehabilitative surgical techniques, new medications, and numerous other medical advances have greatly improved chances for survival, the amelioration of limitations, and options for accommodating disabilities.

But NCD proceeded to make critical judgments of medical treatment of patients with disabilities, noting that people with disabilities frequently see firsthand  evidence that doctors are negatively disposed toward them:

Individuals with disabilities and parents of children with disabilities have encountered numerous kinds of fervently pronounced, but inaccurate predictions by members of the medical profession. Some have been told that they or their children would not survive, or would not regain  consciousness, or would not walk, or would not read, or would not be toilet-trained, or could not live independently, or could not perform particular activities, and yet ultimately found these predictions to be wildly inaccurate.

An April 15, 2020, story by NPR journalist Joseph Shapiro, “People with Disabilities Fear Pandemic Will Worsen Medical Biases,” presented numerous examples of outrageous denials of medical treatment to people with disabilities because of doctors’ prejudice against them. [9] “Almost every person with a disability, or their family, can tell a story of a time when they were treated dismissively or even denied the care they needed,” Shapiro observed. He also described complaints filed by disability groups in several states to challenge crisis of care standards and their application to cut care to individuals with disabilities, prompting the Office for Civil Rights at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to strike down an Alabama policy that would have allowed doctors to deny ventilators to some adults and children with intellectual disabilities or people with “moderate to severe dementia.” The Office for Civil Rights declared that “any guidelines for triage of care could not put disabled people and the elderly ‘at the end of the line’ for care.”

Small wonder that in a report issued in February 2021 a coalition of disability rights and civil rights organizations, and academic authorities, supported by scientific citations and poignant examples, declared starkly, though far from surprisingly to the disability community, that “ [d]iscrimination based on disability is pervasive in the medical profession. ” [10]

In addition to a large body of other supportive authority, this conclusion is firmly corroborated by the results of a groundbreaking survey of practicing physicians’ perceptions of people with disabilities and their health care, the first of its kind, also published in February of this year. [11]   Authors of the survey made a number of important and sobering observations: for centuries, societies have stigmatized people with disabilities; physicians often share these societal prejudices toward those having disabilities; more than 30 years after the enactment of the ADA, the population with disabilities “continues to experience inequitable health care on many levels”; large proportions of practicing U.S. physicians appear to hold biased or stigmatized perceptions of people with disabilities; the authors were “unaware of prior studies in which physicians expressed this level of bias toward other populations that also experience disparities in care (for example, racial or ethnic minorities or people who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender)”; and found it only reasonable that such explicit bias has deleterious effects on care equity for people with disabilities. Nearly one-fifth of survey respondents “strongly” agreed that patients with disabilities are “often treated unfairly in the health care system.” Reacting to the doctors’ attitudes, Dr. Iezzoni, one of the lead authors of the study said, “I was horrified.” The authors also acknowledged the unfortunate fact that medical schools generally do not include disability topics in their curricula.

The existence of pervasive, detrimental discrimination on the basis of disability in medical care has been and is an indisputable reality that makes people with disabilities more at risk from COVID infection, by keeping them from having a fair and equal chance of obtaining protective measures and equipment, medical treatments, timely COVID-19 vaccination, and other benefits and services for avoiding infection; treating the disease effectively; and lessening its short and long-term health consequences.

C.  Based on Other Systemic Inequities that Predated the Pandemic          

• Where People Live and Receive Services

Living in congregate settings increases the risk of infection and death from COVID-19. A high percentage of people in residential treatment and care facilities are elderly people with disabilities. Placement and confinement of people with disabilities in nursing homes, group homes, and other types of congregate living facilities, including psychiatric hospitals and board and care homes, usually means warehousing people with disabilities in settings that have experienced extremely elevated rates of COVID-19 infections, serious complications, and deaths. Too often, these are situations where social distancing is difficult or practically impossible because of shared rooms, shared facilities, and shared staff.

Being forced to live or remain in these types of places to get the services you need has too often become a veritable death sentence due to high infection and death rates. More than 100,000 deaths of residents and staff in long-term care facilities had been reported as of the last week in November 2020 – a number that is certainly an undercount [consider the example of the Attorney General of the state of New York recently reporting that the State Health Department and Governor Cuomo had underreported deaths from COVID-19 in nursing homes by as much as 50 percent [12] ], and does not include all the types of congregate settings where people with disabilities live and receive services.

• Increased Exposure to COVID Virus

Due to factors such as dependence on close interaction with personal care assistance, nursing care, and household help providers; more reliance on public or shared transportation; lower socio-economic status; and higher rates of homelessness and unemployment; people with disabilities tend to have more frequent contact with people at high risk of having been infected with COVID-19, often in the absence of adequate protective measures and equipment, and other safeguards.

• Prior Health and Medical Care Disparities

People with disabilities have long faced barriers to accessing health care due to structural, systemic, architectural, and communication obstacles. People with disabilities also have higher rates of the types of health conditions (e.g., obesity, smoking, heart disease, and diabetes) that are risk factors for severe illness and higher rates of death from COVID-19.

• Other Exacerbating Factors

Some other problems for people with disabilities, such as the lack of affordable, accessible housing and nutritious food, that predated the pandemic and can impair a person’s health, have been significantly intensified by COVID-19.

• Availability of Health Care and Need for Mental Health Services

A fundamental and growing problem is insufficient timely access to adequate health care for people infected with COVID, many of whom are experiencing long-term or permanent effects. In an environment where the protections of the Affordable Care Act have been continually under threat, exclusion of people with pre-existing conditions or ceilings on coverage created serious difficulties for a growing segment of the population. Broadly inclusive health care is crucial for all people at risk for contracting COVID-19, and particularly for those persons with disabilities who are in higher peril from the virus. Another critical need is for more mental health services to address mental health consequences of the pandemic, both for those who had a history of mental conditions before the pandemic and those newly affected by a surge in conditions generated in the COVID-19 era.

A. Discrimination in the Allocation of Treatment and Services

• Crisis Standards of Care

To guide the administration of health care services and systems during epidemics and pandemics, when medical resources are typically stretched, most states and health care systems have for many years adopted “Crisis Standards of Care.” These standards address a wide range of administrative policies, practices, and decisions, including (1) broad matters such as staffing, supplies, and facility space options; and (2) more specific practices and issues, such as treatment alternatives and criteria, use of PPE, and vaccine allocation. Too often, COVID-19 crisis standards of care have incorporated or engendered discriminatory courses of action toward individuals with disabilities, prompting the filing of discrimination complaints in a number of states. The COVID-19 crisis standards plans or their implementation have in many instances resulted in medical restrictions that devalue the lives of people with disabilities. Examples include inappropriate rationing and reallocation (overtly or covertly) of medical treatment, ventilators and other medical devices; and the deprivation of other necessary and often life-saving medical care.

Crisis standards of care have often reflected a bias against disabled people and older adults. They typically prioritize care towards patients who are younger and do not have disabilities, excluding or de-prioritizing those who have certain health conditions, those who are presumed unlikely to survive in the intermediate or long term, and those presumed to require greater resources to survive the acute episode of illness. Crisis standards of  care, therefore, may direct medical resources away from those with certain disabilities due to medical bias, which can be conscious or unconscious. [13]

In “Disability Rights as a Necessary Framework for Crisis Standards of Care and the Future of Health Care,” published in The Hastings Center Report on June 29, 2020, 14 scholars sounded an alert about the problem of disability bias in the framing of COVID-19 crisis standards of care, and advocated for a shift toward what they called “disability justice” as an alternative. [14]   The essay began:

The COVID‐19 pandemic has highlighted systemic disadvantages that people with disabilities face in the health care system. While catastrophic health emergencies demand an immediate response that often precludes addressing underlying systemic discrimination, there is a moral duty to shine a light on structural disability bias that may distort how crisis standards of care are put into practice.

The authors argued “for the full recognition of the moral equality of [people with disabilities] in formulating crisis standards of care and in modifying social and institutional practices in light of the inequities that the crisis highlights and exacerbates, [so that] the demand ‘Nothing about us without us’ is truly met.” They characterized their essay as offering “concrete recommendations for reforms before, during, and after a public health emergency,” and were hopeful that the “work of disability rights groups during this crisis [will] help advance the field of bioethics so it continues to develop as a disability-conscious field of inquiry and practice.”

In the “Physicians’ Perceptions” study discussed previously, the authors declared that “qualitative research studies involving interviews with people with disability suggest that physicians often make erroneous assumptions about patients’ values and preferences, limiting their health care options and compromising quality of care,” and provided several examples with citations. [15]   They added:

Some physicians believe that they have superior technical knowledge about disabling conditions, but they can be wrong, taking actions that harm patients. An example is physicians incorrectly believing that all patients with spinal cord injury cannot feel pain below the level of their injury and therefore refusing to provide pain relief for procedures below that level, thus causing these patients sometimes excruciating pain.

The authors of the survey pointed out that the ADA prohibits eligibility criteria that screen out people with disabilities or people with particular disabilities from receiving lifesaving treatment, or crisis standards of care that exclude or give lower priority of care for persons with particular medical conditions, giving examples of such denials that would not pass muster under the ADA. Ultimately, the authorities and scholars who worked on the report provided a clear overview of their insights into the application of crisis standards of care:

[T]he COVID-19 pandemic has exposed long-standing aspects of US health care that severely disadvantage people with disabilities. As states  promulgated crisis standards of care to guide decisions allocating scarce resources, such as tests, intensive care unit beds, and mechanical ventilators, some of these standards explicitly excluded people with disabilities. Concerns that crisis standards of care would discriminate against people with disabilities prompted the HHS Office for Civil Rights to warn on March 28, 2020, that “persons with disabilities should not be denied medical care on the basis of stereotypes, assessments of quality of life, or judgments about a person’s relative ‘worth’ based on the presence or absence of disabilities.” Our study underscores that many physicians perceive worse quality of life for people with disabilities. The high prevalence of negative perceptions of living with disabilities raises questions about constituting the triage teams that make critical resource decisions when crisis standards of care are invoked. Proactively assessing implicit and explicit biases toward disability among physicians involved in decision making concerning crisis standards of care is critically important. [Emphasis added]

It is essential that decisions about treatment allocation must be made fairly, based on individualized determinations using current objective medical evidence, and not based on generalized inaccurate assumptions about a person’s disability, or metrics that are unfairly weighted against people with disabilities.

• Visitation Policies Affecting Family Members and Support Personnel

Consistent with CDC guidance, most states and health care facilities issued policies restricting visitors as a containment effort in response to COVID-19. To benefit fully from health care and treatment programs and services, some people with disabilities need to have personal contact with support personnel, not only as provided by the facility, but often by family members or other support persons, to assist them. Such supporters may need to be present in person to: facilitate effective communication with health care providers and other staff; coordinate and provide essential services or participate in treatment; give informed consent; and otherwise facilitate equal access to care and treatment. Contact with family members, and outside medical professionals, including specialists and therapists may be key ingredients to physical and emotional well-being of some individuals with disabilities. Individualized modifications to visitation policies, along with precautions to contain the spread of infection, are needed, but too many states and health care systems have placed unnecessary obstacles between people with disabilities and the crucial assistance of their necessary supporters. Health care providers are required to make accommodations for visitation where needed for essential services or effective communication when the absence of such accommodation would impede equal access to care and services.

B. Delay and Failures in Addressing Existing Congregate Settings Issues

• Fundamental Need to Eliminate Unnecessary Residential Confinement

Eliminating unnecessary confinement in restrictive residential facilities is a critical, baseline issue for people with disabilities – both before and even more since the beginning of the COVID-19 crisis. The ADA and court decisions interpreting the law sought to end this type of segregation and recognized a right to receive services in the most integrated setting appropriate to the person’s needs. Despite the fact that this is what many people with disabilities want, and that it’s often less expensive, people continue to be stuck in congregate settings rather than in the community.

• Necessity of Enhanced Use of Medicaid Funding for Home and Community-Based Services

Addressing unwarranted confinement of people with disabilities in restrictive residential facilities must include substantially more investment in home and community-based services (HCBS) to provide opportunities for Medicaid beneficiaries to receive services in their own homes or community rather than in institutions or other isolated settings. For many, Medicaid is the only source of funding for the services to support their activities of daily living (bathing, dressing eating, toileting, etc.) This country provides an entitlement to receive these services in a nursing home setting (places where rates of COVID and related mortality have soared), but the same entitlement does not automatically apply to community settings. States can choose, but are not required, to cover the costs for people to receive services and supports in their homes or community, rather than in an institutional setting, but they should opt to facilitate such funding for people with disabilities.

• Heading in the Wrong Direction Regarding Institutional Confinement

Instead of accelerating moving people out and finding ways to help diminish confinement in congregate facilities by promoting the development of community-based alternatives, the pandemic has resulted in suspending plans for individuals’ return to the community, preventing transitioning out of institutions. At the same time, in the name of allocating beds to the most critically ill patients, hospitals have discharged many patients to nursing homes.

C. Woefully Inadequate Data Collection

• Deficient Data on the Impact of COVID-19 on People with Disabilities

There is a paucity of data regarding how the pandemic has affected those with disabilities and their supporters (paid staff, volunteers, and familial supports). Little data are generally available regarding the numbers of cases, hospitalizations, and deaths in those groups; and data that have been collected are frequently inaccurate. In one widely publicized incident, the Attorney General of the state of New York recently issued a report stating that the State Health Department and Governor Cuomo had underreported deaths from COVID-19 in nursing home populations by as much as 50 percent. [16]   And such understating of incidence of dire results for those with disabilities is hardly rare. In addition to concerns about undercounting of cases and deaths of people with disabilities, some studies have suggested that all too frequently deaths of people with disabilities are inaccurately attributed to underlying disabilities rather than COVID infection. The overall lack of accurate, comprehensive data on impacts on people with disabilities clearly has had detrimental implications for vaccine allocation and other COVID response efforts and funding.

D. Absence of Needed Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)

• PPE Not Provided

Too often people with disabilities and their service providers have not received PPE in circumstances where it is needed to protect such individuals’ safety. There has been a severely inadequate focus on the provision of necessary PPE, both for persons with disabilities and for direct support professionals who provide home and community-based services. This has been fueled by a lack of proper oversight, ignorance of the needs of people with disabilities, and administrative complications and foul-ups.

E. Inadequacies in COVID Testing Programs

• Lack of Priority for COVID Testing of People with Disabilities

In general, COVID-19 testing for people with disabilities and those who provide services to them has not been a priority. As a result, those groups have been under-tested, with the result that contact tracing regarding them has been impaired and often impossible, preventing them from knowing whether they have been exposed to COVID-19 and whether they risk severe illness, and/or infecting their families, friends, and care providers.

• Obstacles to Testing

Barriers have hampered or prevented COVID testing for people with disabilities. These have included architectural, communication, and transportation barriers at testing sites or difficulties in getting to such sites; inaccessible websites, information and scheduling services; documentation requirements (many people with disabilities, including people experiencing homelessness or who have lived in institutions may lack the necessary documents, such as a government-issued photo ID, which can be costly and time-consuming to obtain); and drive-in only testing sites, which can be a barrier or prohibitively expensive for those people with disabilities who do not drive.

F. Inequities, Confusion, and Frustration in Vaccine Allocation for People with Disabilities

• Unclear and Fluctuating Priority for Vaccination of People with Disabilities

As COVID-19 began its rampage around the globe, medical personnel, public health officials, and governmental entities faced an unknown and complex virus. Methods for dealing with it have evolved and changed rapidly as more information, data, and technology have become available. In the United States, the initial lack of centralized governmental policies and standards for treatment, vaccine distribution, and other elements of addressing the pandemic; coupled with the multiplicity of agencies responsible for overseeing, regulating, and implementing preventive and remedial measures; led to a hodgepodge of varying and vacillating policies and standards. Uncertainty and confusion have been widespread in regard to establishing priorities for COVID vaccinations, and particularly as to the prioritization accorded people with disabilities.

• Starting Point – Recommendations of the Centers for Disease Control (CDC)

The CDC has assumed responsibility for making recommendations on the priority in which various groups of people should receive the COVID-19 vaccine. On December 3, 2020, CDC announced that initial supplies of the vaccine should be offered to healthcare personnel and long-term care facility residents; it designated this as Phase 1a of the vaccine rollout. On December 22, 2020, CDC issued recommendations covering Phases 1b and 1c, as follows: Phase 1b included frontline essential workers and people aged 75 and older, while Phase 1c included people aged 65 to 74 years, people aged 16 to 74 with underlying medical conditions , and essential workers other than healthcare personnel (already included in 1b). [17]   CDC proposed and promoted the tiered concept of vaccine prioritization, but its views were merely “recommendations.” It fell to the states and other officials to issue more specific and more-or-less binding orders, policies, and regulations governing the actual implementation of COVID-19 prevention, treatment, and vaccine roll-out programs.

• Underlying Medical Conditions vs. Disabilities

To elaborate on what it meant by “underlying medical conditions” that it sometimes seemed to equate with “disabilities,” CDC referred to a list of “People with Certain Medical Conditions,” that it cautioned is “a living document” that is “not exhaustive and only includes conditions with sufficient evidence to draw conclusions,” and “may be updated at any time.” It was intended to cover adults who “are at risk for severe illness from the virus that causes COVID-19.” [18]   CDC’s commentary on Certain Medical Conditions lists specific conditions in two categories; the first, of persons “at increased risk of severe illness” from the virus associated with cancer, chronic kidney disease, COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease), Down Syndrome, heart conditions, immunocompromised state from organ transplant, severe obesity, sickle cell disease, and Type 2 diabetes; the second, of people who “ might be at an increased risk for severe illness,” includes asthma (moderate-to-severe), cerebrovascular disease, cystic fibrosis, hypertension or high blood pressure, immunocompromised state from causes other than organ transplants, neurologic conditions such as dementia, liver disease, pulmonary fibrosis, thalassemia (a blood disorder), and Type 1 diabetes. [19]   Many of the conditions found on CDC’s two lists would qualify as “disabilities” in many contexts, but the lists are neither precise nor exhaustive, leaving a lot of open questions to be filled in by states and health officials charged with directing and implementing COVID-19 treatment and vaccine administration.

• Disabilities and Eligibility for Vaccine Priority

As state and local governments and medical providers began to roll out their distribution of the COVID-19 vaccine, they identified categories of targeted recipients and began to specify the priority in which people in each category should receive shots. In doing so, they generally tried, at least initially, to follow the CDC recommendations regarding to the degree of priority for persons with disabilities. This was not easy or fool-proof, as the CDC Certain Medical Conditions lists were in large part prepared with a focus on treatment and illness prevention, and informing individuals with information about the risks they might face from COVID-19; did not seek to include rare conditions; and were, as CDC expressly stated, not attempting to be exhaustive. The lists were a relatively small sampling drawn from among a multitude of disabling conditions. For examples of some disabilities not included in CDC’s examples, see the text associated with endnote 23. To some extent, the CDC lists gave an impression of clarity that they did not fully deliver. And while CDC, most medical authorities, and state officials often gave lip-service to the notion that people with disabilities should be prioritized for COVID vaccination, as they are at high risk of severe illness and death from COVID-19, significant questions remained about what level of priority they should be given and to which people with disabilities priority should be extended . Because such lists are used to include some people and exclude others. it is critical that they be developed with substantial involvement, consultation, input, and oversight of the disability community.

• Misguided Quality of Life Judgments

Much of the disability bias and discrimination discussed previously is centered on faulty – usually negative – predictive assessments of the quality of life of individuals (patients) with disabilities. As NCD wrote in 1997:

In reality, such attitudes and negative predictions of life quality have little to do with the actual life experiences of people with disabilities. People with disabilities commonly report more satisfaction with their lives than others might have expected. Though they commonly encounter obstacles, prejudice, and discrimination, most people with disabilities manage to derive satisfaction and pleasure from their lives.

After conducting a nationwide poll of people with disabilities, Louis Harris and Associates reported that “[d]espite their disadvantaged status and frequent exclusion from activities enjoyed by most Americans, a large majority of disabled Americans are satisfied with their lives”; the Harris organization described this as “a remarkable finding in light of the portrait of hardships revealed in these survey findings.” Even individuals who identified themselves as having very severe disabilities tended to report that they were very or somewhat satisfied with their lives. [20]

The report of the coalition of disability rights and civil rights organizations, and academic authorities, on crisis standards of care and intersectional medical discrimination observed that “[n]on-disabled medical professionals frequently presume that disabled people have a lower quality of life, reflecting a lack of understanding about how people with significant disabilities can live fully, enjoy their lives as much as anyone else, achieve as much or more than others, and  where necessary develop alternative strategies to accomplish goals that others assume are off-limits to them.” [21]

And yet, a striking finding of the study on physicians’ perceptions of people with disabilities was that over 82 percent of participants reported that people with  significant disabilities have worse quality of life than people without disabilities. The authors noted that, not surprisingly, some patients with disabilities “express frustration about physicians’ lack of insight into the quality of their daily lives.” Elaborating on this situation, the authors commented:

More than twenty years ago, researchers investigated how perceptions of the quality of life of people with disabilities can diverge from societal assumptions. These inquiries identified a so-called disability paradox: that many people with significant disability equilibrate to living with functional limitations and enjoy good quality of life. Under the disability paradox, “the general public, physicians and other health care workers perceive that persons with disabilities have an unsatisfying quality of life despite the fact that over 50% of these people report an excellent or good quality of life.”

In the COVID-19 pandemic, however, states are too often making decisions about the level of priority to be assigned to people with disabilities for receiving  vaccinations (and treatment) based on uninformed underestimations of quality of life expectations for such individuals.

• Major Vaccine Prioritization Policies and Practices Reflect Discrimination

A number of disagreements and disputes have arisen in regard to prioritization of persons with disabilities for COVID inoculation. Three significant area of concern have been: states that have not made disability a priority category; the failure of eligibility lists to include all those conditions putting people at high risk of infection by the virus; and inoculation information and appointments websites and vaccination sites that are not accessible and disability user-friendly. [22]   Disability advocates pushed for expansion of the conditions on the priority lists (to add a variety of other conditions, including muscular dystrophy, progressive lung disease and respiratory failure, multiple sclerosis, quadriplegia, and cerebral palsy, to name but a few), as well as for higher priority of people with disabilities in general. [23]   Controversy arose about the fact that people who were not residing in long-term care facilities were not prioritized for vaccination even if they have very severe conditions, while people with identical or less severe conditions were near the front of the line for their shots if they lived in a long-term care facility. Residents of nursing homes and assisted living facilities and older adults were prioritized, as is appropriate. But others living in the community were not similarly afforded priority for vaccination even though they are often at higher risk for contracting the virus and have conditions that increase their likelihood of severe disease or death, in part because many receive daily, in-person services and supports that cannot be provided from a distance (coupled with the lack of adequate PPE). Despite objections from the National Council on Disability, nine states have expressly excluded those living at home or in congregate settings other than nursing homes and assisted living facilities (e.g., group homes and psychiatric facilities) from prioritization for the vaccine. [24]   Further, sometimes people with disabilities have a condition that makes them eligible for priority vaccination, but no priority was given to direct support professionals who provide home and community-based services for them. Conversely, in other circumstances, some people with disabilities have not been able to obtain inoculation even though their personal and medical care support personnel have been able to.

• Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities (IDD (or I/DD))

Although CDC has posted some information about developmental disabilities, including intellectual disability, to date it has not included these conditions on its list of People with Certain Medical Conditions that are to be entitled to Phase 1c vaccine priority. This has led to consternation and inconsistency as states have developed their vaccine allocation plans and schedules, complicated by the breadth and inclusivity of the terms “developmental disabilities” and “intellectual disability,” each of which occurs across a spectrum. Studies showing that people with IDD who contract coronavirus die at sharply higher rates than others have led to calls for those conditions to be designated for early inoculation. [25]

On December 15, 2020, the National Council on Disability (NCD) called for “vaccine allocation equity for individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD),” and recommended: “IDD should be included in the list of high-risk diagnoses used to determine vaccine priority…. [I]ndividuals with IDD face alarmingly higher complication and mortality rates from COVID-19, with mortality rates up to 15 percent…. [P]rioritizing individuals with IDD should be made explicit throughout all relevant guidance and state executive orders.” NCD added that “those who live with or provide care to people with IDD should be included in the same phase of vaccine allocation.” [26]   As of this writing, NCD’s protests have yet to persuade many states to address this problem. [27]

• Demotion by Age-Based Approach and Recent Advances

CDC’s placement of adults with underlying medical conditions in the first phase of its recommended vaccine priority recommendations was a positive recognition of the fact that people with disabilities are at greatly increased risk of contracting the COVID-19 virus and of being severely harmed or killed by it. Most states initially followed CDC’s lead on this matter. In more recent times, however, some states decided that, in the name of getting the vaccines out to more people more quickly, they would reorder the priority list to begin immunizing people based on age – effectively de-prioritizing people with disabilities. Previously, people aged 65 or over already took priority under CDC’s recommendations and were included in Phases 1b (75 plus) or 1c (65 to 74). But under some revised state protocols, people less than 65 years of age who met the state’s lower age-floor, whether they have disabilities or not, can “jump the queue” and get inoculated. On February 9, 2021, the National Council on Disability reported:

29 states – Alabama, Alaska, California, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia – and Washington, DC, have all de-prioritized persons with disabilities that fall into that category [having underlying conditions and comorbidities that put them at increased risk from COVID]. [28]

A well-publicized example occurred on January 25, 2021, when Governor Newsom of California announced that the state was switching to an “age-based approach,” meaning that after vaccinating those 65 and over and some essential workers, the state would distribute vaccines based on age rather than high-risk health status, or other criteria such as overcrowded living conditions. [29] This meant that, after completing Phase 1b, California would move to immunize people in the order of their ages, and not on the other factors previously considered, including disability. This approach would basically jettison any priority because of a person’s disability no matter how severe or debilitating.

After considerable outcry from people with disabilities, California officials announced that adults with “certain medical conditions” (disabilities?) that put them at increased risk would be eligible for inoculation, along with people aged 65 or over. Recently, on March 15, 2021, California expanded COVID-19 vaccine eligibility to persons aged 16 to 64 having any of ten conditions from the CDC list of medical conditions that put people at “increased risk of severe illness from the virus that causes COVID-19”; people can also get vaccinated in California in the following circumstances:

• COVID-19 infection is likely to result in severe, life-threatening illness or death;
• Getting COVID-19 will limit the person’s ability to receive ongoing care or services vital to well-being and survival; or
• Providing adequate and timely COVID-19 care will be particularly challenging as a result of the disability.

People are permitted to self-attest that they have a listed disability or other serious condition, and do not have to provide documentation. [30] These changes were estimated to expand eligibility to some 4.4 million additional people, though early reports were that implementation was spotty. [31]

Pushback from people with disabilities and their supporters has helped to ameliorate and fine-tune age-based policies in some other states to some degree. While it is in everyone’s best interest to vaccinate as many Americans as soon as possible, it should not be done through measures that disadvantage and risk the health and lives of people with disabilities by moving them lower on the vaccine eligibility list.

• Current Place of People with Disabilities in the COVID Waiting Line

Important information about the status of people with disabilities in the quest for COVID-19 inoculation emerged in the first week of March 2021. On March 1, the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF), which provides information on health policy matters, issued a substantial and informative “issue brief” report on “COVID-19 Vaccine Access for People with Disabilities.” [32]   After noting that people in nursing homes accounted for a disproportionate share of deaths attributed to COVID-19, the authors contrasted that with the scant data available regarding people with disabilities in other settings:

[L]ess attention has been paid to nonelderly people with disabilities who use long-term services and supports (LTSS) but live outside of nursing homes. This population includes people with a range of disabilities, such as people with autism or Down’s syndrome who live in group homes, people with physical disabilities who receive personal care services at home, and people who are receiving behavioral health treatment in residential facilities. Some nonelderly people with disabilities receive LTSS in a variety of community-based settings such as group homes, adult day health programs, and/or their own homes. Other nonelderly people with disabilities receive LTSS in institutional settings such as intermediate care facilities for people with intellectual or developmental disabilities (ICF/IDD) or behavioral health treatment centers for people with mental illness or substance use disorder. Many nonelderly people with disabilities, both in the community and in institutions, rely on Medicaid as the primary payer for the LTSS on which they depend for meeting daily self-care needs.

The document continued:

Nonelderly people with disabilities and the direct care workers who provide their LTSS have similar risk factors for serious illness or death from COVID-19  compared to their counterparts in nursing homes, due to the close contact required to provide assistance with daily personal care tasks, such as eating, dressing, and bathing; the congregate nature of many of these settings; and the highly transmissible nature of the coronavirus. Seniors in nursing homes are explicitly  included in the top priority group in all states’ COVID-19 vaccine distribution plans, but nonelderly people with disabilities who use LTSS may be not prioritized.

A significant finding in the issue brief addressed the absence of adequate data regarding the impact of COVID-19 on persons with disabilities: “ The wide  variety in state reporting makes it difficult to compare between states or have a complete understanding of how people with disabilities have been impacted by the pandemic.” The data available from the limited number of states reporting them indicated that people who receive long-term services and supports in settings other than nursing homes and assisted living facilities have an elevated risk of COVID-19 infection ranging from 19% to 50% – on a par with rates of infection for residents of nursing homes, and well above the 8% overall rate of COVID infection among the U.S. population as a whole. Though less than comprehensive, the available data support research suggesting that congregate settings, particularly larger facilities, are at high risk for COVID outbreaks.

Noting that “people with disabilities rely on the close physical proximity of caregivers for communication and daily needs, which limits their ability to adopt preventive measures such as social distancing,” the Kaiser issue brief cited several studies documenting that people with various types of disabilities had highly elevated rates of COVID infection and fatalities from it. Moreover, the authors found that direct care workers who provide long-term services and supports outside of nursing homes face increased risks from COVID-19, similar to their nursing home counterparts. And yet, “[f]ew state vaccination plans explicitly mention direct care workers who provide LTSS in settings other than nursing homes.”

As to COVID-19 vaccination for persons with disabilities themselves, the Kaiser document presented a disturbing recognition that “[f]ew state vaccination plans explicitly mention people with disabilities.” It elaborated that “[a] few states do specifically prioritize people with disabilities in their vaccinations plans,” and mentioned eight states that provide some form of priority from among a hodgepodge of disability priority categories.

At the end of the Kaiser Family Foundation policy brief, the authors identified three “other policy issues [that] will affect access to vaccines for people with disabilities”:

• People with disabilities who receive services in the community or in non-nursing facility institutions may face accessibility barriers at vaccine distribution sites.
• People with disabilities and their direct care providers may benefit from focused messaging as part of general vaccine outreach and public education efforts.
• [P]olicymakers may want to consider people with disabilities in data collection efforts to help inform and refine current vaccine distribution and access efforts and identify disparities such as those based on race or ethnicity.

G. Devalued Vaccination Status of Children and Adolescents

• Children and Adolescents Generally

CDC recommendations and most states’ COVID vaccination schedules put a very low priority on the vaccination of young people. CDC recommendations basically gave no priority at all except to those at least 18 years old (or in a few circumstances, 16), even those with underlying medical conditions, though some states have applied their own variations. The primary rationales for this limitation are: (1) that children have not been included in studies of effectiveness and safety of COVID vaccination, so they must wait until such testing has been done; and (2) that, in any case, children and adolescents are unlikely to contract COVID-19, and, if they do, are very unlikely to have severe or fatal cases. The idea that children are at little risk from COVID-19 is actually the basis for both rationales, since the decision not to include children in vaccination testing was a policy decision largely fueled by an a priori assumption that there was no urgency in determining the safety and effectiveness of inoculating children, thus inevitably delaying the possibility of earlier administration of vaccines to them. Moreover, the assumption that risk to children is small or negligible was left untested and unverified because relatively little attention was devoted to testing and compiling data regarding the impact of the pandemic on children.

Actually, considerable scientific evidence indicates that these rationales for low priority of children and adolescents for COVID vaccination are not as straightforward and sound as they are popularly considered to be. Information about COVID infections of children provided by CDC at the end of 2020, and in an article by a panel of medical experts published in JAMA Pediatrics provide pertinent insights. In regard to children aged 1 month to 18 years, CDC presented the following information:

While “fewer cases of COVID-19 have been reported in children (age 0-17) compared with adults,” … “some cases of COVID-19 in the United States reported to CDC were among children. The number and rate of cases in children in the United States have been steadily increasing. The true incidence of [COVID-19] infection in children is not known due to lack of widespread testing and the prioritization of testing for adults andthose with severe illness.”

As to infections and transmission among children, “Recent evidence suggests that compared to adults, children likely have similar viral loads in their nasopharynx [upper part of the throat behind the nose, part of the respiratory system], similar secondary infections rates, and can spread the virus to others.”

In regard to Severity of Illness in Children, “While children infected with [the virus] are less likely to develop severe illness compared with adults, children are still at risk of developing severe illness and complications from COVID-19. Weekly COVID-19 hospitalization surveillance data show that the rate of hospitalization among children is low compared with that of adults, but hospitalization rates among children are increasing. About 1 in 3 children hospitalized with COVID-19 in the United States were admitted to the intensive care unit, similar to the rate among adults.” “A recent systematic review estimated that only 16% of children with [COVID-19] are asymptomatic …” [33]

As to the consequences of COVID-19 infection when contracted by children, CDC declared: “Similar to adults, children with severe COVID-19 may develop respiratory failure, myocarditis, shock, acute renal failure, coagulopathy, and multi-organ system failure. Some children with COVID-19 have developed      other serious problems like intussusception or diabetic ketoacidosis. Children infected with [COVID-19] are also at risk for developing Multisystem  Inflammatory Syndrome in Children (MIS-C).” MIS-C is a serious syndrome characterized by high fever, rash, hypotension, gastrointestinal symptoms, and organ dysfunction. Many of its symptoms strongly resemble a very serious condition known as “Kawasaki disease.” According to a study published in Lancet in December 2020, of eight children between the age of 4 and 14 years diagnosed with COVID-19-related MISC-C, three needed mechanical ventilation, and one died. [34]

The September 25, 2020, JAMA Pediatrics article reported the results of a “systematic review and meta-analysis” of studies bearing on the issue of susceptibility of children and adolescents to COVID-19 compared to adults. [35]   The authors found that “[p]reliminary evidence suggests that children have a lower susceptibility to [COVID-19] infection compared with adults,” but with some significant provisos: “The degree to which children and adolescents are infected by and transmit [the COVID-19 virus] remains unclear,” “the role that children and adolescents play in transmission of this virus remains unclear,” and “[d]ata were insufficient to conclude whether transmission of [COVID-19] is lower than by adults.” One disquieting finding from the data review and analysis was that “children and adolescents younger than 20 years had 44% lower odds of secondary infection with [COVID-19] compared with adults 20 years and older.” Thus, children and adolescents have a 44% risk – not far from half – of the risk faced by those 20 years old and above.

Another article in JAMA Pediatrics , this one published on January 11, 2021, focused on state-reported rates of hospitalizations of children for COVID-19 over  a six-month period. During the study period, the rate of pediatric hospitalizations for coronavirus grew dramatically, from 2 per 100,000 of all COVID hospitalizations to 17.2 by the end of the study. [36]   The authors of the study concluded: “Our results present concerning trends in pediatric hospitalizations.  Adult, and especially geriatric, incidence of COVID-19 continues to dominate the national picture, but pediatric populations may require resources that are not readily available across the country.” One of the study authors observed that before the study “[u]nfortunately, the message of ‘lower risk’ in children was  interpreted as ‘no risk’ by many … [and] testing among children has not been wide-scale and consistent to get a good understanding of prevalence of cases and infection rates among children … Our study shows that children can get sick and hospitalized.” [37]

Illuminating data regarding the impact of COVID on children have been collected by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) and the Children’s Hospital Association from data available from the individual states through their websites and other publicly available reports. In its Summary of Findings updated as of March 5, 2021, AAP found that nearly 3.17 million (3,168,274) children have tested positive for COVID-19 since the onset of the pandemic, representing 13.1% of all cases in the U.S. [38]   Children were found to comprise 1.3% to 3% of reported COVID hospitalizations. And the numbers are increasing: during the two weeks between February 11 to February 25, 2021, there was a 4% increase in the cumulated number of child COVID-19 cases. In the 11 states that reported on their COVID-19 testing, children tested positive 5% to 30% of the time.

Based upon the data, AAP advocated vigorously for prioritizing the vaccination of children. On February 25, 2021, it sent a formal letter to key COVID-19 officials in the federal government urging the Biden Administration to “use every measure available to achieve authorization of COVID-19 vaccines in children as soon as can be done safely.” [39] Stressing the over 3.1 million cases of children infected with the virus during the pandemic, AAP added that the  numbers were rising, with an increase of over two percentage points since November,” and stressed that “[a]mong children who have acquired COVID-19, 247 have died from the virus ….” In light of such statistics, AAP declared:

There is an urgent need for manufacturers to include children in COVID-19 vaccine trials so that our nation’s youngest citizens can benefit from the vaccine as adults have. The same focus and effort from the administration and manufacturers that was expended to enroll adults in COVID-19 vaccine trials must be replicated to enroll adolescents and younger children as soon as possible. Recent predictions from the administration that data for children under age 12 may not be available until early 2022 highlights the need to redouble our efforts to enroll younger children in COVID-19 clinical trials.

AAP issued a news release announcing its letter to Administration officials, with the subheading “AAP writes to White House leaders: Take urgent action so children are not left out of COVID-19 vaccination.” In the release, AAP President, Dr. Lee Savio Beers, commented that “we are not moving fast enough to ensure our children can benefit from these life-saving vaccines,” adding, “This is hard to fathom given how children have suffered throughout the pandemic in ways both seen and unseen. We cannot allow children to be an afterthought when they have shared so much burden throughout this pandemic.” AAP concluded: “We need to apply the same urgency to vaccinate children as we have for adults.”

The current state of CDC recommendations regarding COVID-19 vaccination of people under 20 years of age, as of this writing, is as follows:

CDC has approved the use of the Pfizer vaccine for adolescents 16 years or older, approved the Moderna vaccine for use in persons 18 years or older, and approved the Janssen/Johnson & Johnson vaccine for use for persons more than 18 years of age. [40]

The results of a recent CDC study of COVID-19 infection rates among children clarify that children are being infected at rates much higher than was previously believed, underscoring the need to make vaccines available to children below the current limits of 16 or 18 years, and that COVID cases involving children are being substantially underreported. [41]   The researchers examined blood samples of children in Mississippi between the ages of two months and less than 18 years to identify the presence of COVID antibodies, and compared that with the numbers of reported cases of coronavirus among children younger than 18. They found that, while population-weighted extrapolation of the antibody specimens produced an estimate that over 113,000 children were infected, only about 9,000 COVID-19 cases had been reported during the period covered by the study – a huge disparity! The lead author of the CDC-supported report said that “[w]hile we see that younger children more commonly have milder disease with COVID-19, it turns out that there are lot more kids infected with [the virus] than case numbers indicate. … This study clearly shows that kids can be infected with the virus.” [42]

In fact, it appears, based upon the data from the study, that infection rates of  “persons aged less than 18 were similar to those among persons aged 18-49 years, the age group with the highest seroprevalence during the period.”

• Children and Adolescents with Disabilities

If children in general have been largely an “afterthought,” in prioritizing COVID-19 vaccination, children and adolescents with disabilities have often been a tiny footnote or disregarded entirely. Basically, until very recently, CDC has not called for prioritization of people with underlying medical conditions unless they are at least 16 years old, and many states have followed CDC’s lead. The result is that in most jurisdictions, children with disabilities have not been on the early list for vaccination no matter how severe their conditions are and how vulnerable they are to severe and even fatal COVID infection. Thus, while there has been some recognition that children with disabilities have been and are at increased risk of contracting COVID-19 and being seriously or even fatally affected by it, that fact has not translated to any precedence in obtaining COVID research or vaccine shots. Quite a few disabilities are more prevalent and more injurious in children and adolescents than in adults, and there is no reason to think, or scientific evidence to support, the idea that underlying medical conditions are always less compromising to children and adolescents than to adults. In short, a blanket adults-only standard for COVID vaccination is unwarranted and highly unfair to children and adolescents with disabilities.

III.    Recent Developments and Current Status

A. progress in dealing with the covid-19 pandemic.

As of the one-year anniversary, on March 11, 2021, of the official declaration that COVID-19 was a pandemic, there were signs that we may be beginning to see some rays of light at the end of the tunnel. At the moment, cases and death rates from the virus in the U.S. have begun, at least temporarily, to level out and even decrease some. Vaccinations are increasing rapidly, especially in this country, where, as of this writing, people are being vaccinated at the rate of 2.4 million per day. 41 million people (12.3%) in the U.S. are fully vaccinated, and 116 million vaccination doses have been administered. Dr. Fauci, among other medical authorities, has said that it’s now safe for vaccinated grandparents to visit their grandchildren, and to hug them, indoors without masks and social distancing.

Largely due to pressure from disability advocates and disability organizations, shortcomings of COVID-19 policies and actions regarding people with disabilities are belatedly garnering a modicum of attention and concern. CDC and some states have finally begun to recognize that people with disabilities should be given higher priority for COVID inoculation. On March 3, 2021, the Washington Post reported that CDC was now recommending that states should consider prioritizing people with disabilities. [43] The article said that in allotting vaccine appointments, ‘[t]he latest CDC guidance urges states to consider the ‘unique needs’ of people with disabilities or cognitive decline and their caretakers ….” Advocates for people with disabilities said the updated guidance is “a step in the right direction but does not go far enough.” “It doesn’t resolve the overall uncertainty and lack of clarity for people with disabilities and their families,” said Peter V. Berns, chief executive officer for the Arc of the United States, which advocates for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities.

In the same March 3, 2021, issue of the Washington Post containing the story about CDC guidance advising prioritization of people with disabilities, there was an article describing the Biden Administration’s pursuance of a “stepped-up” vaccination process in the hope of getting “every adult in America” vaccinated by the end of May (a goal the Administration subsequently moved ahead to May 1).

Change in the COVID-pandemic landscape is in the air, and things are happening rapidly. On March 11, President Biden signed the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 into law. To speed up the country’s recovery from the economic and health effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and the ongoing recession, the new law, also referred to as the COVID-19 Stimulus Package, dedicates $1.9 trillion to support individuals, businesses, and states affected by COVID-19. Among a long list of funding programs in the Act, it provides billions of dollars for helping elementary and secondary school students return to the classroom; funding for COVID-19 vaccine distribution and administration, COVID-19 testing, contact tracing, and genome sequencing; one-year funding for Medicaid home and community-based services (HCBS); [44] and temporary increases of subsidies for people purchasing health insurance through the Affordable Care Act’s marketplace.

On the same day that he signed the American Rescue Plan Act, President Biden made a prime- time speech to the American people, in which he said he would direct states to make all Americans 18 and over eligible to get vaccinated by May 1, predicted a possible return to some semblance of normalcy for vaccinated people by the Fourth of July, and announced several measures aimed at speeding up vaccinations across the country.

B. Ongoing Flaws and Problems for People with Disabilities in COVID-19 Pandemic Efforts

Despite important progress and significant advances as the battle against the coronavirus continues, the situation is hardly a rosy one for people with disabilities. Most of the serious problems discussed previously in this essay are continuing; many of them have not even been acknowledged, much less remedied. Disability advocates are continuing to battle for safe and equitable treatment in numerous contexts.

One disquieting note for people with disabilities and many other Americans was chronicled in another article in the Washington Post on March 3, 2021, which reported that some states, led by Texas and Mississippi, shortly thereafter followed by Arkansas, Massachusetts, North Carolina, and Virginia and several others, were abandoning some or all of their coronavirus restrictions. [45]   These changes, which permit those states’ residents to stop wearing masks; dine at restaurants without capacity limits; and go to bars, and sports and entertainment venues, and other gatherings that had previously been closed or restricted, raise serious concerns. The Post reported that “[t]he rush to reopen has alarmed federal health officials who believe it could threaten important progress in fighting the virus at a fragile time and open the door to another surge this spring.” There is some evidence that such surges in COVID-19 infection have already begun in some states that relaxed their restrictions.

Also problematic and disappointing is President Biden’s focus on “every adult in America” for vaccination – what about the children and particularly children with disabilities? And children in other categories that render them at greater risk from coronavirus?

The tenor of the current good news/bad news phase of the COVID-19 era is perhaps captured by several recent news events in the state of Maryland. On March 2, 2021, Governor Larry Hogan announced that, in the interest of speeding up COVID-19 inoculations, Maryland was opening up three new mass vaccination sites, and that he was threatening to take unused vaccine doses away from local health departments that did not administer all their coronavirus doses within one week and give them to other vaccine administerers. [46]   These actions were in keeping with the strong push for maximizing vaccinations as soon as possible led by the Biden Administration and gaining traction in many parts of the country. A week later, on March 9, 2021, Governor Hogan announced that he was easing many coronavirus restrictions in the state, including lifting capacity limits at restaurants and opening large indoor and outdoor venues to 50% capacity – declaring prior rules null and void – while keeping in effect the state’s mask mandate. The announcement reportedly caught local officials and public health authorities unawares, leaving many Maryland jurisdictions scrambling to consult with their attorneys to assess the impact of the Governor’s edict on their local public health rules. One public health professor’s initial reaction to the unexpected announcement was, “Wow!”; she added that “[t]here is going to be risk in reopening so quickly, especially when the vast majority of Marylanders [90%] are still unvaccinated.” [47]

On the same day as Governor Hogan’s announcement of Maryland’s COVID reopening, The Arc of the United States issued a news release declaring that on the day before (March 8), The Arc of Maryland filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland, alleging that Baltimore City and five Maryland counties were discriminating against people with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) by denying them opportunities to access COVID-19 vaccinations, in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act. [48]   In the case, styled The Arc Maryland v. Mayor and City Council of Baltimore Maryland , The Arc Maryland, represented by The Arc of the United States, Disability Rights Maryland, and a private law firm, alleged that “[p]eople with I/DD face heightened risk of serious illness and death from COVID-19,” and that mortality rates among people with I/DD are much higher than people without I/DD. The complaint further alleged that the defendant jurisdictions had omitted people with I/DD from their vaccine eligibility lists and from the jurisdictions’ website services associated with getting vaccinated – preregistration, registration, and telephone contact information. As a result, according to the complaint: “People with I/DD are not aware that they are eligible for the vaccine; are unable to schedule appointments, register, pre-register, or complete interest forms for Defendants’ vaccines; and are delayed or denied access to critical health care services.” [49]

The president of the board of The Arc Maryland declared that “[i]t is frustrating to have our state recognize people with IDD to be in the 1B priority group for the vaccine, only for people with IDD to be denied equitable access to the vaccine from the counties in which they live. We hope this action will result in immediate change for the benefit of all.” [50]   The litigation director of Disability Rights Maryland added:

We need these localities to take immediate corrective action to fix their information; to fix forms that exclude individuals with disabilities from claiming eligibility and seeking vaccine appointments; to tell health department staff and others that people with disabilities are eligible and to assist them with obtaining the vaccine. The Americans with Disabilities Act was passed over thirty years ago with a purpose of ending historic inequities in health care. We need immediate action to protect lives. [51]

C. Much More Needs to Be Done to Achieve Equal Access to Medical Equipment, Services, Facilities, Treatment, and Vaccinations

While some things in the battle against COVID-19 would seem to be looking up, we still have a long way to go. In most states, COVID-19 vaccinations have not been, and are not being, provided to anyone under age 18, and it was only on March 16 that the Moderna drug company announced it was going to begin testing the use of its vaccine in children under 18, including infants under six months; another study of children ages 12 to 17 is already underway, with results that might be available beginning this summer (after which, if successful, the vaccine would still have to await official authorization before it could be administered) to those less than 18 years old. [52] Alarmingly, the Moderna announcement specified that the testing would only be done on “healthy children,” presumably meaning that it would not be able to provide data about the safety of vaccinating children with disabilities.

And even the notion that it’s okay for vaccinated grandparents to cuddle unvaccinated grandchildren is far from as clear as it seems. A March 18, 2021,  article in the Washington Post , “A Visit to Grandma’s? Not Quite Yet: With Variants Circulating and Guidance Limited, Fear Persists after Shots,” [53] sounded a cautionary note: “It is still unclear whether vaccinated people can transmit the coronavirus, and new guidelines released … from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention did not clearly delineate what is and is not safe for them to do.” As one 80-year-old grandmother observed, the new guidelines “make me more confused than not. It seemed to say one thing in one place, and then you read down further, it negated what you had read.” The article added:

After the pandemic began, many Americans, especially the oldest and most vulnerable, clung to the belief that a vaccine would return them to pre-coronavirus life. But after a year of surges, variants and conflicting or revised opinions from medical authorities, many are questioning – and arguing with their loved ones about – whether the vaccine will be their golden ticket back to the wider world.

Many people who had the requisite vaccine shots are still very leery of unmasked, indoor visits with unvaccinated people. The article elaborated: “[T]he promise of the current vaccines has been clouded by the rise of new variants that may elude them. And with four-fifths of Americans yet to get a first shot, vaccinated people have a hard time knowing how to protect themselves and their family members.”

The CDC guidance restricted permission to meet with (and hug) only those unvaccinated people who are at low risk of severe COVID. The implications of this limitation for meeting with people, especially children with disabilities, given that the CDC has been very hazy as to which disabilities entail high risk of severe COVID infection and that the states have been all over the board about the link between severe COVID susceptibility and disabilities, leaves people in the dark about what is safe. Is it or is it not acceptable to get together indoors without masks and hug, and perhaps smooch, your grandchildren who have asthma, quadriplegia, muscular dystrophy, cerebral palsy, multiple sclerosis, or some other disabling condition? Should grandparents and other relatives not living in the same household feel entitled to close visits with their relations, including young children who have disabilities that might render them highly susceptible to harsh consequences of COVID? Given that very, very few children have been vaccinated for COVID-19 (nor has testing been done to determine the safety of  the vaccines for them), and that we do not yet know for sure if vaccinated people can pass the virus to others, isn’t there good reason to be wary of encouraging close contact without the safeguards and masks we have otherwise been requiring? Is the go-ahead-and-hug-now approach justified by scientific data or merely by nostalgic, wishful-thinking that children aren’t really at risk from the virus, and vaccinated people aren’t really very likely to spread the disease – neither of which is validated by presently available scientific evidence? Why endanger our loved ones with disabilities at this point before we have given them priority for vaccine protection? If such questions are answerable at the present time, they have not yet been answered with clarity and consistency by medical authorities or anyone else.

And who gets left holding the bag in the meantime? People with disabilities and their families.

Disability and legal rights advocates have made some important progress since the beginning of the pandemic, but the fact that these fights have been necessary on issue after issue, and in state after state, and that many of them still need to be fought, demonstrates that we’re still far from “elimination of discrimination against individuals with disabilities,” the stated purpose of the ADA . More data, research, and progress is needed in almost every aspect and phase of defeating the COVID-19 virus in a manner that achieves safety, fairness, and equity toward people with disabilities.

This essay has identified a number of ways in which measures to address the COVID-19 pandemic have shafted persons with disabilities, and analyzed how and why people with disabilities were shortchanged. As all Americans and all agencies of government and the private sector do their parts to end the pandemic and get the country back on its feet, they need to do so in a way that ensures equal justice and avoids discrimination against people with disabilities. Doing so will involve two interrelated components: (1) Recognizing and putting into action certain fundamental principles about fair and humane treatment of people with disabilities; and (2) Operationalizing policies and measures addressing the COVID-19 crisis to reflect the needs and respect the human and legal rights of people with disabilities.

A. Fundamental Guiding Principles

• People with disabilities’ lives are of equal value as other peoples’ lives, and they should be treated as full and equal members of society, with equally valuable rights, dreams, and freedoms.
• It is essential that people with disabilities be part of the planning, development, and implementation of policies, programs, and rules affecting them. As people with disabilities often insist, “Nothing about us without us.”
• People should never be warehoused on the basis of disability. Now more than ever, we can see that it is not only discriminatory and unfair, it’s dangerous. As the Supreme Court has declared, People with Disabilities Receiving Services in Residential Facilities Must Be Served in the Most Integrated Setting Appropriate to the Needs of the Individual.
• To the maximum extent possible, individuals with disabilities shall be allowed to live independently: to exercise freedom of choice; to live where and how they choose; to live within the community in the neighborhood they choose; and to decide their own pattern of life.
• Health care should be available to all. It is essential for people with disabilities.
• Policies, programs, and rules affecting people with disabilities must be based on evidence and verifiable data, not on misperceptions, biases, or uninformed assumptions about disability.
• Prohibitions of discrimination against people with disabilities in the Americans with Disabilities Act and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act are fully applicable to public accommodations and state and local government entities, which include, along with a wide range of other businesses and services, medical care providers, public health agencies, and pharmacies and other prescription drug vendors. And these prohibitions are legally enforceable.

B. Rectifying COVID-19 Policy and Practice Shortcomings

• People with disabilities, both adults and children, are at increased risk from COVID-19 infection. Because of their higher medical vulnerability, they need to be accorded more attention, and priority in all facets of addressing the COVID pandemic.
• The existence of pervasive, detrimental bias and discrimination on the basis of disability in medical care has been and is an indisputable reality that makes people with disabilities more at risk from COVID infection. Preventing people with disabilities from having a fair and equal chance of obtaining protective measures and equipment, medical treatments, timely COVID-19 vaccination, and other benefits and services for avoiding infection; and not treating the disease effectively, thereby lessening its short and long-term health consequences, put people with disabilities at unnecessary risk.
• It is essential that decisions about treatment and vaccine allocation must be made fairly, based on individualized determinations using current objective medical evidence, and not based on generalized inaccurate assumptions about a person’s disability, or metrics that are unfairly weighted against people with disabilities.
• To improve medical misperceptions of people with disabilities and their lives, physicians and other medical personnel need more training and information about disability and first-hand experience with people with disabilities; medical and nursing schools, and related educational institutions and programs should include disability topics and familiarization as substantial parts of their curricula. Moreover, they should make earnest and sustained efforts to recruit students with disabilities and to hire people with disabilities in medical care positions. The article “Physicians’ Perceptions of People with Disability and their Health Care” included a finding that “[a]ll levels of medical education should include more training about disability, including disability cultural competence and etiquette. Training that provides greater empathy about patients’ daily lives, such as house calls or standardized patients who have disability, might offer important insights.” [54]
• The lists of “People with Certain Medical Conditions,” that were developed by CDC and applied by the states, and ultimately became a category of people given some priority for COVID-19, were incomplete, confusing, and unfair to people with various disabling conditions. Health authorities should refine and expand the lists of medical conditions that make people more susceptible to, and more at risk of severe harm or death from, the coronavirus, making them more inclusive, clear, and disability-informed.
• Determining eligibility and priority of people with disabilities for vaccination, treatment, and testing should not be made in a restrictive, technical manner. Some states are now taking people’s assertions of disability at face value, without demanding burdensome, or any, documentation. Giving people claiming to have disabilities the benefit of the doubt in lieu of unwieldy scrutiny would not seriously interfere with our nation’s goal of getting everybody inoculated as soon as possible.
• More awareness of and sensitivity to disability. and a bit of creativity, could have enabled health authorities to devise more manageable ways to identify and confirm individuals’ disabilities. The issue of establishing disability involves some complexity, including sensitivity about self-identification and “invisible disabilities,” but it might have been addressed more effectively with some relatively simple ideas, along with soliciting and following the advice and input of people with disabilities and disability organizations. Perhaps, for example, people could be allowed to establish their disabilities by producing a Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) number, an Individualized Education Plan (IEP) under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), an Individualized Rehabilitation Plan under the federal Rehabilitation Act, documentation that they have Disabled Veterans status, or perhaps even a disability parking sticker. And the documents listed here are certainly not all-inclusive. Such approaches based on long-standing government-based designations should be considered as soon as possible.
• Very little testing and study of people with disabilities have been done to determine the prevalence, riskiness, and progression of COVID-19. Particularly lacking is solid scientific information regarding children with disabilities. Data from such research and tracking is sorely needed to ensure optimal protection for persons with disabilities, and should be made an urgent priority.
• Although standards are beginning to evolve rapidly, current COVID-19 vaccination eligibility in most jurisdictions, and under CDC recommendations, is limited to people aged 18 or over, or 16 in a few circumstances. Studies of the safety and effectiveness of inoculating younger children is only in the beginning stage. Lack of urgency for vaccinating adolescents, children, toddlers, and infants has been explained on facile assumptions of a lack of risk of infection and serious harm for younger people, not fully justified by available data. The blanket adults-only policies are unfair and perilous for the nation’s children, and particularly risky for children with disabilities. Vaccination of everyone under 18 needs to become a most urgent priority as soon as possible.
• Often unnoticed by many people without disabilities are barriers to equal participation by people with disabilities in accessing to COVID-19 medical treatment, vaccinations, and research, posed by inaccessible websites and facilities. People seeking to use online resources to obtain information, identify treatment and vaccination options, schedule appointments, etc., are stymied when COVID-19-related websites are not in compliance with accessibility standards, are not user-friendly, or are otherwise inaccessible to users with various disabilities. Likewise, people with disabilities trying to obtain treatment, vaccination shots, testing, or other services at a hospital, doctor’s office, clinic, other medical service facility, pharmacy, and the like, find that they cannot get into the facility or get served there because of architectural or communications barriers. Full and equal access must be a baseline prerequisite for all COVID-19 services and programs.
• The necessity for some people to have direct support assistance has not been adequately recognized and accommodated in relation to COVID-19 treatment and vaccination requirements. Some people with disabilities have a condition that makes them eligible for priority vaccination, but no priority was given to direct support personnel who provide home and community-based services for them. Conversely, in other circumstances, some people with disabilities have not been able to obtain inoculation even though their personal and medical care support personnel have been able to. Whether they reside in nursing homes, other kinds of congregate living facilities, or in the community, people should be permitted to have and be accommodated in having, their necessary personal and medical care support assistance, and their support personnel should be eligible for priority vaccination.
• Overall data collection regarding people with disabilities and their susceptibility to COVID-19 infection and its severe consequences, the safety and other consequences of their being inoculated, and of the medical and personal treatment they have received, has been paltry. And research studies in regard to children with disabilities and COVID treatment and vaccination have been few. Given the complexities of and serious consequences at stake with COVID infection in people with disabilities, it is of the utmost importance to have more and better research and collection of other types of data on the interplay between the coronavirus and children and adolescents with disabilities.
• Consultation and involvement of people with disabilities in the development of crisis care standards, vaccine prioritization, and other policies, programs, and guidance dealing with the COVID-19 crisis has been very much “too little, too late.” For people with disabilities, it is absolutely necessary and should be standard operating procedure and an expected facet of all policies, programs, and transactions for addressing the pandemic, that there should be “Nothing about us without us.” Accordingly, people with disabilities must be part of the planning, development, and implementation of all prevention, treatment, immunization, and support policies, protocols, and delivery systems for addressing the virus and its consequences.

C. Conclusion

As people with disabilities are very aware, they have had a hard way to go during the COVID-19 pandemic. Through no fault of their own, on average they have faced more risk than people without disabilities of contracting COVID-19, and, if they do, of having severe symptoms, of being hospitalized, of having to be put on a ventilator, and of dying from the disease. In addition to dangers from the virus itself, and the disruptions to normal life it has entailed, many people with disabilities have been subjected to egregious forms of discrimination, described in this essay, that have heightened the hardships and risks they face. Rectification of these injustices is overdue and essential. In the apt words of the Lauren Young, litigation director of Disability Rights Maryland: “ The Americans with Disabilities Act was passed over thirty years ago with a purpose of ending historic inequities in health care. We need immediate action to protect lives.” [55]

Many thanks to my trusty editor and wonderful life partner, Andi Farbman.

[1] National Council on Disability, “COVID-19 Letter to HHS Office for Civil Rights” (March 18, 2020), found at https://ncd.gov/publications/2020/ncd-covid-19-letter-hhs-ocr

[2] The passage is derived from Robert Burgdorf, The Legal Rights of Handicapped Persons,  (1980) p. 51. It has been widely quoted in whole or in part.

In first introducing the Americans with Disabilities Act in the Senate on April 28, 1988, Senator Lowell Weicker cited the quoted language on the first page of his introductory Floor Statement .

[3] DEMOCRACY NOW, February 9, 2021, Disabled Advocates Demand Better Vaccine Access as They Face Greater Risks of Dying from COVID-19, at https://www.democracynow.org/

[4] CDC, People with Certain Medical Conditions , updated Feb. 3, 2021, found at https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/need-extra-precautions/people-with-medical-conditions.html

[5] Tim Jin, “Op-Ed: Why is California’s age-based COVID-19 vaccine policy overlooking disabled people like me?” Los Angeles Times (Jan. 29, 2021), at https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2021-01-29/covid-vaccine-disabled-people-priority

[6] Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law, Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights under Law, DREDF, The Arc, Center for Public Representation, Autistic Self Advocacy Network, Justice in Aging, CUNY School of Law, National Disability Rights Network, Natalie M. Chin, & Jasmine Harris, “Examining How Crisis Standards of Care May Lead to Intersectional Medical Discrimination Against COVID-19 Patients” (Feb. 2021), at http://www.bazelon.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/FINAL-Intersectional-Guide-Crisis-Care-PDF.pdf

[7] National Council on Disability, Assisted Suicide: A Disability Perspective (March 24, 1997), at  https://ncd.gov/

[8] Id., at https://ncd.gov/publications/ , quoting U.S. Comm’n on Civil Rights, Accommodating the Spectrum of Individual Abilities  26 (1983).

[9] Joseph Shapiro, “People with Disabilities Fear Pandemic Will Worsen Medical Biases” (Apr. 15, 2020) found at https://www.npr.org/

[10] Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law, Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights under Law, DREDF, The Arc, Center for Public Representation, Autistic Self Advocacy Network, Justice in Aging, CUNY School of Law, National Disability Rights Network, Natalie M. Chin, & Jasmine Harris, “Examining How Crisis Standards of Care May Lead to Intersectional Medical Discrimination Against COVID-19 Patients” (Feb. 2021), p. 4, found at http://www.bazelon.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/FINAL-Intersectional-Guide-Crisis-Care-PDF.pdf

[11] Lisa I. Iezzoni, Sowmya R. Rao, Julie Ressalam, Dragana Bolcic-Jankovic, Nicole D. Agaronnik, Karen Donelan, Tara Lagu, and Eric G. Campbell, “Physicians’ Perceptions of People with Disability and their Health Care,” Health Affairs, vol. 40, no. 2 (Feb. 1, 2021), found at https://www.healthaffairs.org/

[12] Corky Siemaszco, “New York Gov. Cuomo Facing Calls to Apologize for Undercounting COVID-19 Nursing Home Deaths,” NBC News (Feb. 16, 2021), found at https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/new-york-gov-cuomo-facing-calls-apologize-undercounting-covid-19-n1258053

[13] Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law, Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights under Law, DREDF, The Arc, Center for Public Representation, Autistic Self Advocacy Network, Justice in Aging, CUNY School of Law, National Disability Rights Network, Natalie M. Chin, & Jasmine Harris, “Examining How Crisis Standards of Care May Lead to Intersectional Medical Discrimination Against COVID-19 Patients” (Feb. 2021), at p. 6, found at http://www.bazelon.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/FINAL-Intersectional-Guide-Crisis-Care-PDF.pdf

[14] Laura Guidry‐Grimes, Katie Savin, Joseph A. Stramondo, et al., “Disability Rights as a Necessary Framework for Crisis Standards of Care and the Future of Health Care,” The Hastings Center Report (June 29, 2020), found at https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/

[15] Lisa I. Iezzoni, Sowmya R. Rao, Julie Ressalam, Dragana Bolcic-Jankovic, Nicole D. Agaronnik, Karen Donelan, Tara Lagu, and Eric G. Campbell, “Physicians’ Perceptions of People with Disability and their Health Care,” Health Affairs, vol. 40, no. 2 (Feb. 1, 2021), found at https://www.healthaffairs.org/

[16] Corky Siemaszco, “New York Gov. Cuomo Facing Calls to Apologize for Undercounting COVID-19 Nursing Home Deaths,” NBC News (Feb. 16, 2021), found at https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/new-york-gov-cuomo-facing-calls-apologize-undercounting-covid-19-n1258053

[17] CDC, CDC’s COVID-19 Vaccine Rollout Recommendations , updated Feb. 19, 2021, found at https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/recommendations.html (emphasis added).

[18] CDC, People with Certain Medical Conditions , updated Feb. 3, 2021, found at https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/need-extra-precautions/people-with-medical-conditions.html

[19] Id. The lists also include the activity of smoking and the condition of pregnancy that would not usually be considered to be disabilities in and of themselves.

[20] National Council on Disability, Assisted Suicide: A Disability Perspective (March 24, 1997), at https://ncd.gov/publications/1997/03241997#4b4

[21] Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law, Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights under Law, DREDF, The Arc, Center for Public Representation, Autistic Self Advocacy Network, Justice in Aging, CUNY School of Law, National Disability Rights Network, Natalie M. Chin, & Jasmine Harris, “Examining How Crisis Standards of Care May Lead to Intersectional Medical Discrimination Against COVID-19 Patients” (Feb. 2021), at pp. 4-5, found at http://www.bazelon.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/FINAL-Intersectional-Guide-Crisis-Care-PDF.pdf

[22] Cecilia Nowell, “This Women-Made Tool Could Help to Get More Disabled People Vaccinated: States Aren’t Prioritizing the Disabled Community, Advocates Say,” The Lily (Feb. 25, 2021), found at https://www.thelily.com/this-women-made-tool-could-help-get-more-disabled-people-vaccinated/

[23] Liz Bowen, Whose Underlying Conditions Count for Priority in Getting Vaccine? Scientific American (February 6, 2021), at https://www.scientificamerican.com/ ; DEMOCRACY NOW, February 9, 2021, Disabled Advocates Demand Better Vaccine Access as They Face Greater Risks of Dying from COVID-19, at https://www.democracynow.org/

[24] National Council on Disability, NCD Letter to NGA re: Vaccine Allocation (Feb. 9, 2021) at https://ncd.gov/newsroom/2021/ncd-makes-recommendations-national-governors-association-covid-19-vaccination-equity

[25] Michael Diament, People with Developmental Disabilities at Highest Risk of Death from COVID-19, Study Indicates , Disability Scoop (November 16, 2020); Michael Diament, COVID-19 Vaccine Should Go to Those with Developmental Disabilities First, Advocates Say, Disability Scoop (December 7, 2020), at https://www.disabilityscoop.com/ ; Roni Caryn Rabin, Developmental Disabilities Heighten Risk of COVID Death . by Roni  Caryn Rabin . , The New York Times, November 11, 2020, at https://www.nytimes.com/ ; Scott Landes, Margaret Turk, Margaret Formica, Katherine McDonald, & J. Dalton Stevens, COVID-19 Outcomes among People with Intellectual and Developmental Disability Living in Residential Group Homes in New York State, Elsevier Public Health Emergency Collection (October 13, 2020), at https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/ ; Stetson Miller, Experts: Those with Intellectual, Developmental Disabilities 3 Times more Likely to Die from COVID-19 , Baltimore (WJZ), January 12, 2021, at https://baltimore.cbslocal.com/

[26] National Council on Disability, NCD Recommends COVID-19 Vaccine Allocation Equity for Individuals with I/DD (Dec. 15, 2020), found at https://ncd.gov/newsroom/2020/ncd-recommends-covid-19-vaccine-allocation-equity-individuals-idd

[27] American Network of Community Options and Resources (ANCOR), The Implications of State COVID-19 Vaccine Distribution Plans for People with Intellectual & Developmental Disabilities (December 2020) , at https://www.ancor.org/

[28] National Council on Disability, NCD Letter to NGA re: Vaccine Allocation (Feb. 9, 2021) at https://ncd.gov/newsroom/2021/ncd-makes-recommendations-national-governors-association-covid-19-vaccination-equity (emphasis added).

[29] Sonia Sharp, Californians with Disabilities Are Outraged over Vaccine De-Prioritization , Los Angeles Times (February 2, 2021), at https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2021-02-02/disabled-californians-outraged-vaccine-de-prioritization ; Elliot Kukla, Where’s the Vaccine for Ableism? , New York Times, Feb. 4, 2021, at https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/04/opinion/covid-vaccine-ableism.html ; Sammy Caiola, “As California Makes Age a Bigger Factor in When You Get Vaccinated, People with Disabilities Are Concerned,” CAPRADIO, (Jan. 28. 2021) at https://www.capradio.org/articles/2021/01/28/as-california-makes-age-a-bigger-factor-in-when-you-get-vaccinated-people-with-disabilities-are-concerned/

[30] Nouran Salahieh, Lauren Lyster, & Megan Telles, “Californians with Certain Health Conditions, Disabilities Can Now Sign Up for COVID-19 Vaccine, KTLA (Mar. 15, 2021), found at https://ktla.com/news/california/californians-with-certain-health-conditions-disabilities-can-now-sign-up-for-covid-19-vaccine/+

[31] Catherine Ho & Matthias Gafni, “Bay Area Counties Open Vaccines to All Adults with Disabilities and Health Conditions, But Access Is Spotty,” San Francisco Chronicle (March 15, 2021), found at https://www.sfchronicle.com/local/article/Bay-Area-counties-open-vaccines-to-all-adults-16027731.php

[32] MaryBeth Musumeci and Priya Chidambaram, “COVID-19 Vaccine Access for People with Disabilities, Kaiser Family Foundation (March 1, 2021), found at https://www.kff.org/medicaid/issue-brief/covid-19-vaccine-access-for-people-with-disabilities/

[33] CDC, “Information for Pediatric Healthcare Providers” (updated Dec. 30, 2020), found at https://www.cdc.gov/

[34] Suriya Rehman, Tariq Majeed, Mohammad Azam Ansari, and Ebtesam A. Al-Suhaimi, “Syndrome Resembling Kawasaki Disease in COVID-19 Asymptomatic Children,” Journal of Infection and Public Health (Dec. 2020) Vol 13 no. 12, pp. 1830–1832, found at https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/ , citing Riphagen S., Gomez X., Gonzalez-Martinez C., Wilkinson N., Theocharis P. Hyperinflammatory shock in children during COVID-19 pandemic. Lancet (London, England)  2020, vol. 395(no. 10237): pp. 1607–1608, found at https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/

[35] Russell M. Viner, Oliver T. Mytton, Chris Bonell, et al, “Susceptibility to SARS-CoV-2 Infection Among Children and Adolescents Compared with Adults: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis,” JAMA Pediatrics (September 25, 2020), vol. 175, no. 2, 143-156, found at https://jamanetwork.com/

[36] Zachary Levin, Kimberly Choyke, Archelle Georgiou, et al., “Trends in Pediatric Hospitalizations for Coronavirus Disease 2019,” JAMA Pediatrics (published online January 11, 2021, found at https://jamanetwork.com/

[37] Ken Downey Jr., “Rate of Pediatric COVID-19 19 Hospitalizations Has Increased,” Healio (Jan. 11, 2021), (quoting Professor   Pinar Karaca-Mandic), found at https://www.healio.com/news/

[38] American Academy of Pediatrics, Children and COVID-19: State Level Data Report (updated Mar. 5, 2021) found at https://services.aap.org/en/pages/2019-novel-coronavirus-covid-19-infections/children-and-covid-19-state-level-data-report/

[39] American Academy of Pediatrics, Letter to Jeffrey Zients, Dr. Anthony Fauci, Dr. David Kessler, and Dr. Janet Woodcock (Feb. 25, 2021), found at https://downloads.aap.org/

[40] See, AAP, COVID-19: Frequently Asked Questions About COVID-19 Vaccine (updated as of March 2, 2021), found at https://services.aap.org/en/pages/2019-novel-coronavirus-covid-19-infections/covid-19-vaccine-frequently-asked-questions/

[41] Charlotte V. Hobbs, Jan Drobeniuc, Theresa Kittle, et al.. “Estimated SARS-CoV-2 Seroprevalence Among Persons Aged <18 Years — Mississippi, May–September 2020,” CDC, MMWR Morb Mortal Wkly Rep 2021;70:312–315 (Mar. 5, 2021), found at https://www.cdc.gov/

[42] Sam Cohen, “CDC Study: COVID-19 More Prevalent in Children Than Originally Thought,” News5 Cleveland (Mar. 4, 2021) found at https://www.news5cleveland.com/

[43] Lena H. Sun, “CDC: States Should Prioritize People with Disabilities to Receive Vaccine Access,” The Washington Post , March 3, 2021, at p. A6; online under the title “CDC: States should prioritize people with disabilities as they broaden vaccine access,” at https://www.washingtonpost.com/

[44] States can receive a 10% increase in their Federal Medical Assistance Percentage (FMAP) for federal matching funds. States will be required to implement or expand one or more activities to enhance HCBS. This should result in a total of almost $12.7 billion of dedicated funding to strengthen and expand access to Medicaid HCBS.

[45] William Wan, Brittany Shammas, Ashley Parker, and Laura Meckler, “Biden Puts Accelerated Timeline on Shot Supply,” The Washington Post , March 3, 2021, at p. A1; continued on page A6 under the subtitle “Worries of Setback Grow as States Loosen Their Restrictions.”

[46] Lola Fadulu, Erin Cox, and Rebecca Tan, “Maryland to Prioritize Vaccines for Health Departments Quickly Administering Doses,” The Washington Post (Mar. 2, 2021), found at https://www.washingtonpost.com/

[47] Alex Mann and Bryn Stole, “Maryland COVID Reopening: State to Lift Limits at Restaurants, Stores; Large Venues to Allow 50% Capacity,” the Baltimore Sun (Mar. 9, 2021) (quoting Dr. Leana Wen of George Washington University), found at https://www.baltimoresun.com/coronavirus/bs-md-hogan-coronavirus-update-20210309-eqevuamwdba7dg34pzsy5trwea-story.html

[48] The Arc of the United States, “Vaccine Discrimination: Disability Advocates File Federal Lawsuit Alleging 6 Maryland Jurisdictions Discriminate in Vaccine Process” (March 9, 2021), found at https://thearc.org/vaccine-discrimination-disability-advocacy-groups-file-federal-lawsuit-alleging-6-maryland-jurisdictions-discriminate-in-vaccine-process/

[49] Complaint in The Arc Maryland v. Mayor and City Council of Baltimore Maryland , case no. 1:22-cv-00593-CLR (filed Mar. 8, 2021) at pp. 3-4.

[50] The Arc of the United States, “Vaccine Discrimination: Disability Advocates File Federal Lawsuit Alleging 6 Maryland Jurisdictions Discriminate in Vaccine Process” (March 9, 2021) (quoting Ray Marshall) found at https://thearc.org/vaccine-discrimination-disability-advocacy-groups-file-federal-lawsuit-alleging-6-maryland-jurisdictions-discriminate-in-vaccine-process/

[51] Id., quoting Lauren Young.

[52] Denise Grady, “Moderna Begins Testing COVID Vaccine in Babies and Children,” New York Times (Mar. 16, 2021) found at https://www.nytimes.com/   2021/03/16/health/moderna-covid-vaccine-children.html

[53] Tara Bahrampour & Samantha Schmidt, “A Visit to Grandma’s? Not Quite Yet: With Variants Circulating and Guidance Limited, Fear Persists after Shots,” Washington Post , p. B1 (Mar. 18, 2021).

[54] Lisa I. Iezzoni, Sowmya R. Rao, Julie Ressalam, Dragana Bolcic-Jankovic, Nicole D. Agaronnik, Karen Donelan, Tara Lagu, and Eric G. Campbell, “Physicians’ Perceptions of People with Disability and their Health Care,” Health Affairs, vol. 40, no. 2 (Feb. 1, 2021) (footnotes omitted), found at https://www.healthaffairs.org/

[55] The Arc of the United States, “Vaccine Discrimination: Disability Advocates File Federal Lawsuit Alleging 6 Maryland Jurisdictions Discriminate in Vaccine Process” (March 9, 2021), (quoting Lauren Young), found at https://thearc.org/vaccine-discrimination-disability-advocacy-groups-file-federal-lawsuit-alleging-6-maryland-jurisdictions-discriminate-in-vaccine-process/

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An Essay on Modeling: The Social Model of Disability

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From its first exposition almost half a century ago, the social model of disability has been aimed at altering both theory and practice, bringing about profound changes in people’s understanding of disability, and in the daily lives of disabled people as well. The social model’s foil, and on some accounts its antithesis, is the medical model of disability. Both models treat disability as a locus of difficulties. While the medical model takes disability to be a problem requiring medical intervention—and as both the prerogative and the responsibility of medical professionals to fix—the social model understands disability as a political problem calling for corrective action by citizen activists who alter other people’s attitudes and reform the practices of the state. These two conceptualizations of disability have been treated as competitors, as if one must prevail over and eradicate the other in thinking about who disabled people are and what should be said and done in regard to them.

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A New Human Rights Model of Disability

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Silvers, A. (2009). An Essay on Modeling: The Social Model of Disability. In: Ralston, D., Ho, J. (eds) Philosophical Reflections on Disability. Philosophy and Medicine, vol 104. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-2477-0_2

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Disability Essay | Essay on Disabled Person, People With Disabilities, Concept of Disability in Media

December 22, 2021 by Prasanna

Disability Essay: The definition of “disability” is not set in stone. It can vary quite a bit depending on how it is being broken down. This means we can group disabilities under some general themes, but sometimes, there are situations that do not fit neatly into these categories. For example, most disabilities are thought of as orthopedic disabilities, that is, disabilities involving the body and its functions.

However, there is also what is called ” cognitive disability.” This is not something people think of as easily, because in most cases the disability is invisible. But although this type of “disability” has no outward appearances, it can and does affect a great many people. As the labels imply, “cognitive disability” refers to conditions or diseases of the brain. The most well known type of cognitive disability is Alzheimer’s disease, which is an irreversible, progressive mental deterioration that usually begins with old age.

You can also find more  Essay Writing  articles on events, persons, sports, technology and many more.

Diverse Nature of Disabilities

As discussed above, disability is a multifaceted and complex state, and may extend to: cognitive function, sensory impairment, physical, self-care limitation, and social functioning impairment. Disabling conditions may be acquired as a result of genetics/chromosomal abnormalities or as a consequence of environmental agents. As noted, the condition may be c (e.g., back pain that requires physical therapy) or irremediable (loss of a limb due to an accident). Coping with disability is hard, especially when you live alone and need to rely on yourself for everything. But the key thing to remember is that disability affects everyone in different ways. It’s very rare that two people will experience the same exact disability due to the diverse nature of disabilities.

Concept of Disability in Media

It’s pretty rare to see disability depicted accurately in the media, to be honest. And even if disability is portrayed accurately, it usually isn’t in a very graphic way. More often than not, the media attempts to tell the story of disabled people without actually portraying disabled people . There is a lot of work that needs to be done for the public to understand disability. For example, most media will never portray a person with a real disability in a leading role.

Are the Jobs and Environments open to Disabled People?

Some of the occupations you are considering are likely conducted in an environment that is restricted or even inaccessible to disabled people. For example, many administrative roles are conducted within a chair-free office setting. This may make it impossible for someone who is mobility impaired, has joint problems, or suffers from arthritis to take up this position.

Moreover, you may be surprised to learn that a number of occupations are physically taxing and the nature of the work puts the worker into vulnerable positions. Such environments are undoubtedly  difficult for individuals with physical disability. For example, a person who is visually impaired or otherwise has difficulty moving around in the workplace may not have the ability to physically reach items safely. This can lead to accidents that can result in injuries or even loss of life.

How do People with Disabilities Live a Full-Filling Life?

You might think that people with disabilities live very full-filling lives, but in reality, often they don’t. It’s quite hard for them to find job opportunities in the workforce. They may also find it difficult to do many simple, day-to-day tasks. Nevertheless, one of the best things is to find joy by strengthening relationships in all aspects of your life – reaching out to others and making an effort to take care of yourself. Volunteering or doing activities that interest you, even if you are disabled is also a good way to keep yourself engaged. Regardless, with proper training and motivation, people with disabilities can live a fulfilling life.

Social isolation is a major problem for many people because a life with disabilities can be quite lonely. Such people should develop a support system to counteract this problem. One solution to this problem is social media – this is due to the fact that social media is an easy way to make new friends because everyone from all over the world has access to the internet. People with neurological symptoms could make use of treatment from a psychiatrist to help reduce anxiety, stress and depression. Early intervention can be effective particularly to children with disabilities and in order to deal with this issue, substantial support should be provided by family members.

A Few Tips for Living With a Disability

The U.S. Census Bureau counts approximately 34-37 million people, or roughly 10% of the population, as living with a disability in the United States as of 2014. These people experience anything from hearing or muscular limitations to paralysis and cognitive challenges. It’s only logical that there is a lot going on in our day-to-day life that we do to cope with these limits and remain happy and successful. If you’re living with a disability yourself, here a few tips that might help a bit:

• Always treat yourself with respect and self-love. While people might not always treat you the way you deserve to be treated, always be kind and understanding towards yourself, because you’re truly half of life’s happiness.
• Make sure your surroundings are safe for you. For example, if stairs are a real challenge for you, make sure your apartment is on the ground floor or at least the first floor.
• Budget your day to strengthen your sense of purpose. For example, if going out and socializing makes you feel good and can be done in a way that doesn’t make you feel too exhausted, try to plan the week ahead in such a way that one of the days is reserved for that purpose. Remember to leave yourself a little energy reserve to rest!
• Remember, people around will be there for you .
• The experience of being alone can also be positive if you do it in a way that is meaningful and enjoyable for you . For example, painting, playing guitar, writing stories, watching a movie, etc.
• Remember that you are not a machine and learn to care better for yourself and become aware of your own limits when it comes to physical, emotional and mental energy.

Conclusion on Disability Essay

Being disabled can affect many aspects of life. Moreover, most places are not easily accessible to those with disabilities – transportation, public amenities, and more. Even employment opportunities are limited, though some institutions will have certain reservations for the disabled in place. Regardless, there are ways to make our world more accessible for those with disabilities. First off, it is important to educate the general population on what they can do to help combat this issue. Raising awareness and educating others is paramount. Those with disabilities should not be “fixed” but rather accommodated.

A good place to start is by teaching schools how to accommodate those with physical disabilities, then encourage children who are differently abled that they can still make a contribution to society. The same applies for workplaces where employers need to reevaluate their cultural perspective so as not to be discriminatory against disabled employees (some laws against workplace discrimination do exist and are published by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission).

FAQ’s on Disability Essay

Question 1. What is a disability?

Answer: Disability means that you have a physical or mental impairment, which changes how your body works. The impairments can affect things like your bones, muscles, brain, sight, hearing, speech, movement or the way you think. When you first find out that you have a disability, it can be an overwhelming experience.

Question 2. How to cope with a disability?

Answer: The following are some tips for how to cope with a disability: 1) Get educated on disabilities and disabilities rights. 2) Seek out support from family, friends, and professionals. 3) Join a self-advocacy group or other social group related to your condition. 4) Save money for the future by saving part of your income and/or getting financial assistance from the government or private organizations. 5) Prepare for emergencies by making lists of emergency contacts and creating an emergency plan with your family members or friends.

Question 3. What are examples of disability?

Answer: The following are examples of disability:

• Conduction Deafness
• Visual Impairments
• Motor Impairments
• Cerebral Palsy
• Polio Disease
• Muscular Dystrophy
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Disability: Definitions and Models

Philosophers have always lived among, and often as, people who could not see, walk, or hear; who had limited mobility, comprehension or longevity, or chronic illnesses of various sorts. And philosophers have lived in societies that respond to these and other bodily differences in a wide variety of ways. And yet philosophical interest in these conditions and the social response to them was piecemeal and occasional until the past hundred or so years. Some of these conditions were cited in litanies of life’s hardships or evils; some were the vehicle for inquiries into the relationship between human faculties and human knowledge (see entry on Molyneux’s problem ). But the treatment of disability as a subject of philosophical interest in its own right is relatively new.

The lack of attention to “disability” or the related concept of “impairment” may have a simple explanation: there were no such concepts to attend to until nineteenth century scientific thinking put variations in human function and form into categories of abnormality and deviance. Once such categories were established, it became possible to talk, and generalize, about (first) “the disabled”, and (then) “their impairments”, and philosophers have done so for various purposes [Hacking, 1990; L. Davis, 2002: Ch. 4]). The resurgent political philosophy of the second half of the last century, preoccupied with eliminating or reducing unearned disadvantages, tended to treat disability as a primary source of those disadvantages, to be addressed with medical correction or government compensation (Cohen 1993; Sen 1993). Somewhat later, social philosophers began to see disability as a source both of discrimination and oppression, and of group identity, akin to race or gender in these respects. And biomedical and other practical applied’ ethicists have been concerned to help policy-makers construct and interpret new legal and regulatory frameworks making central reference to “disability” and related concepts.

For these reasons and others, philosophers have had much to say, initially in passing and now at length, about what disability is and what “disability” means. This entry will discuss both issues—first, detailing philosophical engagement with longstanding debates over the correct “model” or general framework for understanding disability as a phenomenon; second, asking how philosophers have come to understand the meaning of concepts denoted by words like “disability” and “impairment”, as those have been used in various empirical and normative discourses concerning people with disabilities.

1.1 Medical and Social Models

1.2 an affirmative model, 1.3 models, decisions, and policies, 2.1 philosophical discussion of official definitions of disability, 2.2.1 normal-function views, 2.2.2 the welfarist view, 2.2.3 social constructionisms, 2.2.4 inability views, 2.2.5 skepticism about defining disabilities, other internet resources, related entries, 1. models of disability.

Many different characteristics have been considered disabilities. Paraplegia, deafness, blindness, diabetes, autism, epilepsy, depression, and HIV have all been classified as “disabilities”. The term covers such diverse conditions as the congenital absence or adventitious loss of a limb or a sensory function; progressive neurological conditions like multiple sclerosis; chronic diseases like arteriosclerosis; the inability or limited ability to perform such cognitive functions as remembering faces or calculating sums; and psychiatric disorders like schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.

Disabilities like these have been objects of study in sociology, medicine, and policy debates for much longer than they have been subjects of sustained interest in philosophy. These discourses do not tend to define “disability” by way of the sort of rigorous necessary and sufficient conditions philosophers often prefer. But they have been centrally concerned with broadly definitional issues, often discussed under the heading of “models” of disability—that is, general theoretical perspectives concerned to say what in the world social scientists are investigating when they investigate disability. These models generally pick out, both (1) a set of phenomenon as what needs explaining, when we explain disability, phenomenon typically but not necessarily characterized as disadvantages ; and (2) an explanation of these phenomenon—again, typically, but not solely, an explanation of why disabled people experience the disadvantages they do.

In their extreme forms, the medical and social models serve to chart the space of possible relationships between bodily difference and functional limitation more than to reflect the actual views of individuals or institutions. (A variety of more formal models, described in Altman 2001, graphically represent the causal complexity of disability.)

The medical model explains disability disadvantage in terms of pathological states of the body and mind themselves. It regards the limitations faced by people with disabilities as resulting primarily from their bodily differences. The medical model is rarely defended explicitly, but aspects of it are often adopted unreflectively, when health care professionals, bioethicists, and philosophers ignore or underestimate the contribution of social and other environmental factors to the limitations faced by people with disabilities.

In contrast, the social model explains the characteristic features of disability in terms of a relation between an individual and her social environment: the exclusion of people with certain physical and mental characteristics, or “impairments”, from major domains of social life. Their exclusion is manifested not only in deliberate segregation, but in a built environment and organized social activity that preclude or restrict the participation of people seen or labeled as having disabilities. A variety of social models are embraced by disability scholars and activists in and outside of philosophy. The “British social model” associated with the Union of the Physically Impaired against Segregation (UPIAS 1976) appears to deny any causal role to impairment in disability:

In our view, it is society which disables physically impaired people. Disability is something imposed on top of our impairments by the way we are unnecessarily isolated and excluded from full participation in society. Disabled people are therefore an oppressed group in society. Disability [is] the disadvantage or restriction of activity caused by a contemporary social organization which takes no or little account of people who have physical impairments and thus excludes them from participation in the mainstream of social activities.

Two features of this influential statement are worth noting, although we will only discuss the second at length. First, it limits itself to physical impairments; second, it contrasts impairments , individual characteristics or conditions, with disabilities , disadvantages imposed by society on those with impairments. The first feature inaugurates a long tradition in disability activism and scholarship of focusing exclusively on “physical” disability, to the neglect, if not the exclusion, of intellectual, psychiatric, and other “mental” disabilities. Both scholars and activists have long criticized, and sought to broaden, this narrow focus, and even those philosophers who continue to focus on physical disability recognize that adequate models and definitions must include mental disabilities as well. In the rest of this entry, we will not distinguish between the two types of disability except when it is relevant to a particular model or definition; we will note when an account is limited to physical disabilities or criticizes other accounts for that limitation.

The second feature, the distinction between impairment and disability, will be more central to our discussion. It is through those terms that the medical and social models have been distinguished, and it is this “anatomy” of disability that several recent philosophical definitions have rejected or significantly modified.

Implicit in the UPIAS understanding of disability are two ways that society imposes limitations on disabled people, corresponding to two distinct strands that might be a part of any social model. When the UPIAS claims that society “excludes” people with impairments, this suggests the minority group model , which sees people with impairments as a minority population subject to stigmatization and exclusion. On this view, the main reason people with disabilities encounter hardship is because they suffer discrimination along the same lines as racial or ethnic minorities. Accordingly, civil rights protections and anti-discrimination laws are the proper responses to disability (e.g., Hahn 1987 [1997] and Oliver 1990). Perhaps the most familiar expression of the minority-group model is found in the preamble to the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), which describes people with disabilities as “a discrete and insular minority”—an explicit invocation of the legal characterization of racial minorities.

The UPIAS also asserts that “contemporary social organization” fails to “take into account” people with disabilities. This suggests the human variation model, according to which many of the challenges faced by disabled people do not result from their deliberate exclusion, but from a mismatch between their characteristics and the physical and social environment. On this view, disability is

an extension of the variability in physical and mental attributes beyond the present—but not the potential—ability of social institutions to routinely respond. (Scotch & Schriner 1997)

This view of disabilities as the result of human variations is closely related to the view that disability is a universal human condition (Zola 1989) or shared human identity (L. Davis 2002: Ch. 1). The claim that disability is universal can be taken as nothing more than a prediction that we will all acquire familiar disabilities at some point in our lives. But that claim is better construed as one about the nature of disability; as maintaining that all human beings have physical or mental variations that can become a source of vulnerability or disadvantage in some settings.

These two versions of the social model are not incompatible, differing mainly in emphasis. The discrimination stressed by the minority group model generally leads to, and is expressed in, the societal failure to accommodate people with various differences. In some contexts, it is appropriate to analogize people with disabilities to racial or other minorities; in others, it is important to reject a dichotomy between disability and normality and treat impairments as continuous variations. If one goal of social policy is to remove discrimination and its enduring disadvantages, another is to encompass the full range of human variation in the design of the physical environment and social practices.

Although the social model, in one version or another, is now the dominant legislative, social-science, and humanities paradigm for understanding disability, stronger versions of it – particularly the British Social Model exemplified by UPIAS – have been subject to extensive criticism. Some argue that an adequate conceptualization of disability requires a recognition of impairments as an objective basis for classification, to distinguish disability discrimination from other types of discrimination (Bickenbach 1993). Several critics argue that extreme versions of the model implausibly deny or understate the role of impairment itself as a source of disadvantage (Anastasiou & Kauffman 2013; Terzi, 2004, 2009; Shakespeare 2006). Others, however, contend that this criticism is misplaced, because the British Social Model does not deny the importance of impairments but rather seeks to restrict the application of the term “disability” to social exclusion and oppression (Beaudry 2016).

Another objection is that the social as well as the medical model both rest on a false dichotomy between biological impairments and social limitations. There are two versions of this objection. One maintains that disability is a complex phenomenon, in which biological impairment and social exclusion are deeply interwoven and difficult to tease apart (Martiny 2015; Anastasiou & Kauffman 2013). The other version of this objection rejects the treatment of impairment as a (strictly) biological phenomenon. “Impairment”, the argument goes, is no less a social construction than the barriers faced by people so classified (more on this below). Claims that there is a stable biomedical basis for classifying a variation as an impairment are called into question by shifting classifications; by the “medicalization” of some conditions (shyness) and “demedicalization” of others (homosexuality). Moreover, the social environment appears to play a significant role in identifying and, arguably, in constituting some impairments (dyslexia) (Cole 2007; Shakespeare 2006; L. Davis 2002: Ch 1; Tremain, 2001, 2017; Amundson 2000). What counts as an impairment may depend on which variations appear to be disadvantageous in familiar or salient environments, or on which variations are subject to social prejudice: Less-than-average height may be more readily classified as an impairment than greater-than-average height because the former is more often disadvantageous in environments designed for people of average height, or because it is generally seen as less desirable. For such reasons, it is difficult to establish the objectivity of the impairment classification by appeal to a clear and undisputed biomedical norm. Amundson (2000), indeed, goes so far as to deny that there is any biological basis for a concept of functional normality—a claim emphatically rejected by Boorse (2010).

The debate between the medical and social model about the source of the disadvantages disabled people experience has dominated academic discourse about disability since the 1970s. More recently, however, disability activists and disabled scholars have questioned the apparent shared assumption of both models, that disability is fundamentally a matter of disadvantage, exclusion, or functional limitation. This to take a (partly) different view on what an account of disability should explain; a view consistent in principle with either a more medical or more social view of what does the explaining. The affirmative model of disability and impairment, as articulated by John Swain and Sally French (2000), holds that disability is not in the first instance a problem—not simply or solely a “personal tragedy”, and implicitly, not simply or solely a social injustice either. Rather, disability is a different way of living in and experiencing the world, one not characterized by its disadvantages any more than its advantages.

Note that this is not a claim about what causally explains disability; rather, it is a claim about what aspects of the phenomena of disability should serve as the object of explanation in social scientific theories of disability. As such, the affirmational model is prima facie consistent with either the medical or the social model, and indeed tends to draw on considerations from both. The diverse mix of advantages and disadvantages that characterize life with disability can derive from biological factors, social factors, or interactions between the two. On the side of advantage, a person with a disability like blindness might celebrate the increased attention sightlessness saves for hearing and other senses as well as the solidarity they experience with other disabled people as they fight together against ableism and for social justice. On the side of disadvantage, the affirmational model will point to the considerations some would regard as personal tragedies as, instead, a combination of purely functional challenges to be overcome, and conditions of social exclusion that can make life harder without thereby making it any less valuable or worth living.

Still: though logically independent of claims about the evaluative import of disability, the medical and social models suggest different views about the impact of disability on well-being, and different views about how disability is relevant to reproductive decisions, medical interventions, and social policy. The affirmational model is likely to be more in sympathy with social than medical models here. Those who accept a social model of disability regard the association between disability and well-being as highly contingent, mediated by a variety of environmental and social factors (Campbell & Stramondo 2017). They also tend to question conceptions of well-being that give a central role to the possession or exercise of the standard array of physical and mental functions, as those conceptions imply, or are often taken to imply, that well-being is precluded or diminished merely by the absence or limitation of those functions (see entry disability: health, well-being, and personal relationships ). As a result, they generally see the disadvantages of disability not only as externally caused, but as less formidable than they appear to people who view disability in largely biomedical terms. These differences are reflected in the conflicting assessments of life with disabilities found in the bioethics and public policy literature on the one hand, and disability scholarship on the other (contrast Brock 2005 with Goering 2008).

The different models of disability—and particularly, the medical and social models—have always been interpreted as favoring different responses to disability. The medical model appears to support the correction of the biological condition (or some form of compensation when that is impractical); the minority group model appears to favor measures to eliminate exclusionary practices or at least recognize their injustice; the human variation model appears to favor reconstruction of the physical and social environment to take into account a wider range of differences in human structure and function (measures that could in turn make the social environment less exclusionary).

But claims about the causal explanation of disadvantage do not always yield straightforward prescriptions for their remediation (Wasserman 2001; Samaha 2007; Barclay 2018). In some cases, medical or surgical “correction” may be the most effective way to escape discrimination; if correction is not appropriate, that is because it reinforces discriminatory attitudes and practices, not because it is discriminatory per se . Even an affirmational model does not straightforwardly imply that we should change society rather than disabled bodies: that disabled people have reason to be proud of their disabilities and/or impairments does not immediately entail claims in justice on the rest of us to incur the costs of accommodating these differences. This is to be expected: the proper response to the disadvantages associated with disability depends not only on causal attributions and prudential evaluations, the domains of the three “models”, but also on moral judgments about responsibility, respect, justice.

This is not to say that these causal attributions, much less prudential judgments, are morally irrelevant: to the extent that social causation of disability disadvantage makes social institutions morally responsible for the limitations disabled people face, it may be unfair and disrespectful for society to ask disabled people to change themselves rather than changing itself to be more inclusive (Aas 2020). Moreover, “correcting” disability may (as the affirmational model reminds) us involve destroying valuable forms of life and reducing the vibrant diversity of human embodiment; or it may not do not enough to counterbalance the benefits of uniformity (Garland-Thomson 2012). Contra the sense that the social, medical, and affirmational models each come bundled with obvious policy consequences, it seems clear on reflection that there is much yet to do to understand just what these different explanations of disability imply as to how we should respond to it.

2.Definitions of Disability

Until relatively recently, there was little independent philosophical discussion of definitions of disability. Instead, philosophers focused primarily on developing and interpreting legal and regulatory definition needed to implement disability policy. The legal definitions, in turn, were heavily influenced by the two-part “anatomy”—impairment and social response—of the social model of disability, which was developed by activists seeking to influence legislation and policy.

Thus, two familiar features are shared by most official definitions of disability, such as those in the World Health Organization (1980, 2001), the Disability Discrimination Act (UK), and the Americans with Disabilities Act (United States): (i) a physical or mental characteristic labeled or perceived as an impairment or dysfunction and (ii) some personal or social limitation associated with that impairment. Impairments are generally seen as traits of the individual that he or she cannot readily alter. Just what makes a condition a trait or attribute of an individual is obscure and debatable, but there seems to be agreement on clear cases. Thus, poverty is not seen as an impairment, however disabling it may be, nor is tasteless clothing, even if it is a manifestation of impaired fashion-sense rather than scarce income. On the other hand, diseases are generally classified as impairments, even though they are often neither permanent nor static conditions. Diseases that are especially transient, however, such as the flu and the measles, do not normally count as impairments.

As in early philosophical debates about competing models, the most controversial issue in defining disability is the relationship between these two features. At one extreme are definitions that imply, or are read to imply, that biological impairments are the sole causes of limitation. The definitions in the World Health Organization’s 1980 International Classification of Impairment, Disability, and Handicap, and the Disability Discrimination Act (UK) have been interpreted this way. At the other extreme are definitions that restrict the limitations faced by disabled people (as such) solely to “contemporary social organization”, such as the definition given by the Union of the Physically Impaired Against Segregation (UPIAS 1976). In between are definitions which assert that individual impairment and the social environment are jointly sufficient causes of limitation. Perhaps the best-known example is the WHO’s International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (World Health Organization 2001, referred to as ICF), which emphasizes that disability is a “dynamic interaction between health conditions and environmental and personal factors”.

Through much of the first two decades of this century, philosophers were largely content with this definitional approach to disability as a relationship or interaction, disagreeing primarily on the comparative contribution of the two elements and the policy relevance of their contributions. As noted in the last section, dissenters mainly focused on the characterization of one or both elements, as, e.g., on the first as social vs. biological, rather than on the “anatomy” itself. More recently, however, there has been some movement away from reliance on these two-part approaches to defining disability (e.g., Barnes 2016, and much of the literature responding). One reason may be that in most settings, we do not think of or refer to disabilities as relationships or interactions, but as individual somatic or psychic traits, states or conditions (including absences and deficiencies). These commonsense referents are hard to find in, for example, the multifactorial charts by which the ICF illustrates its definition of disability as a complex interaction of health conditions with environmental, social, and personal factors.

Some might argue that ordinary usage is ideological, shaped by false failure to be conscious of the insights of social and interactionist models. But defining “disability” in rough conformity to ordinary usage hardly implies that its referents are selected by biomedical criteria, let alone that the traits selected cause the disadvantages faced by their bearers or dictate the appropriate social response to those disadvantages. Rather, this view on what “disability” and “people with disabilities” refer to is compatible with a wide variety of positions on how those referents are picked out: e.g., by biomedical criteria; by the rules of a civil-rights movement; by the assumptions of the dominant ideology about bodily dysfunction; or by the demands of justice. The extent to which what counts as a disability, or a person with a disability, varies with context will depend on the account adopted; on biomedical accounts, the extension of “disability” will be as stable as human biology; on other accounts, it will change with changing social norms, economic needs, or political developments. Further, on some accounts, the referents will have common features, identifiable by inspection; on others, what they have in common can only be understood in terms of an ideology or a theory of justice.

After discussing several types of accounts, we will address the claim, inspired by the diversity of traits and conditions they pick out, that “disability” has no core meaning, and that it may be futile and distracting to search for one.

2.2 Philosophical Definitions of Disability

Outside of legal and policy interpretation, philosophers have made a number of claims about the definition of “disability”—at first, mostly only in passing, during discussion of other matters, like “disease” and “health”; later as an increasingly important philosophical topic in its own right.

Given the pervasiveness of medical models of disability in the culture, one would think that at least some recent philosophers would defend a view of disability on which it is defined in terms of pathology or departure from normal functioning (see entry on concepts of health and disease ). So far we can tell, however, no one has done so explicitly, in print. Christopher Boorse, perhaps, comes closest, when he says:

at first sight, one expects disability […] to consist of a pathological condition severe enough to have certain morally and legally important effects. (Boorse 2010: 60–61)

Though Boorse only broaches the possibility of such a definition, without defending, his broader views about health and disease may seem to support this approach. If, as Boorse argues there is a good naturalistic sense of “pathology” as (statistically) downward departure from species-typical functioning, then that notion can be inputted into our moral and political thinking to produce a definition of disability on the following pattern:

S is disabled, in a context C , iff

• S has a pathology—that is, some part of their body performs its normal function at statistically subtypical levels,
• In C , that pathology causes effects that make a difference, of kind D , to how S ought legally or morally to be treated

To fully develop this view, of course, one would need to say what sort of moral/legal difference pathology is supposed to make—not just any difference will do, since it would not follow from the fact, say, that everyone has a legal or moral right to treatment for transient injuries or diseases that all these conditions are disabilities. Note also that, though this view mentions the medical concept of pathology, as a definition of disability it does not entail a medical model, or indeed even the denial of the affirmational model. The medical/social debate will turn on the extent to which it is pathology itself that makes a moral difference, rather than pathology in combination with social factors. The affirmational model debate will turn on just which effects are definitive of disability; if these are all negative or harmful, it will be harder to understand disability as something to be proud of. But the bare fact that disability arises from pathology, on this definition, does not necessarily preclude pride in it, given Boorse’s normatively neutral definition of pathology.

That said, few philosophers seem inclined to defend this way of defining disability. Many philosophers are skeptical of the analytic division between facts about bodily function and social and ethical norms, arguing that there is no way to define disease or pathology independent of “normative” considerations (Wakefield 1992; Kingma 2007; entry on concepts of health and disease ). Those sympathetic to the claims of the disability may have more specific qualms, as well. Those attracted to the “human variation” version of the social model may be skeptical that all of the bodily difference that make for disability are statistically atypical in the required way, e.g., very common or universal conditions like age-related hearing loss or atherosclerosis. Those who tend more to a “minority group” model will tend to see the bodily differences that matter to disability as perceived or represented difference, rather than actual difference. And anyone with any sympathy to the social model at all will tend to think that, as-so-far stated, this definition puts its philosophical precision in the wrong place: that it is at least as important to understand what social, moral, and legal effects characterize disability as to understand which sorts of causes these effects must have to count as “disabling”.

Kahane and Savulescu (2009; Savulescu & Kahane 2011) propose a reforming definition of disability that promises to avoid potentially problematic references to pathology. Their basic idea is that a disability is a (broadly) bodily condition that makes its bearer worse off. To wit:

“disability” should refer to any stable physical or psychological property of subject S that leads to a significant reduction of S ’s level of wellbeing in circumstances C , excluding the effect that this condition has on wellbeing that is due to prejudice against S by members of S ’s society. (Savulescu & Kahane 2011: 45.)

This view adopts certain insights of the social model: in particular in holding that disability is relative to circumstance and in downplaying the role of pathology or biological abnormality in defining disability (note there is no reference to “impairment”, not even records or appearance of impairment).

In other ways, however, it seems to be significantly out of step with both the letter and the spirit of social models of disability. On this definition, a condition which is only harmful in virtue of social prejudice would not be a disability. Even the softer social model implicit in the Americans with Disabilities Act allows that some people are disabled solely in virtue of being “regarded as” impaired; those in that group who experience discrimination as a result would still not be “disabled” on Kahane and Savulescu’s view. Just how out of step this judgment is with the usual commitments of the social model, may depend on the relative importance it places on prejudice as compared to other factors in producing disability disadvantage. A social model that cleaves closely to a “minority group” understanding of ableist injustice may find that this definition excludes the paradigm cases of disability, people who experience gross or net reductions in advantage due to prejudicial phenomenon like stigma and intentional exclusion. A “human variation” account of most disability disadvantage would see more possibility for people to be disadvantaged by non-prejudicial mismatches between atypical bodies and societies built for typicality, since this account will say that many of the welfare costs experienced by people with atypical bodies are not a result of prejudicial attitudes per se , even if they often reflect structurally unjust failures of inclusion.

It should be even more clear that the affirmational model of disability is in substantial tension with this harm-requiring definition of disability. Granted, affirmation of disability may not be formally inconsistent with defining it in terms of harm, since it is possible in principle to take pride in or otherwise be glad about something that leads to a reduction in our well-being (since there are things in life that matter, besides our own well-being). But affirmational models generally hold that being disabled is not always or in general a cost to our well-being (Swain & French 2000; Barnes 2016). This would be a conceptual falsehood, on the welfarist view: something which is not a cost to well-being in some context is simply not a disability.

Are these decisive problems for defining disability in terms of welfare? Much depends here on what we intend to do with definitions of disability. If the goal is to capture ordinary usage, a welfarist view may be on the right track. It might account, for instance, for the broad appeal of slogans like “deafness is not a disability” and euphemisms like “differently abled”; these expressions, on this view, would be ways of emphasizing some of the substantive evaluative intuitions behind the affirmative model, that most conditions we call disabilities are not so bad absent prejudice. That said, disability scholars and activists have tended to be skeptical of such expressions, on the grounds that they undermine efforts to see disabled people as a politically salient group with similar experience of ableism and strong reason to work together for justice, rather than to simply commiserate. If a definition of disability should advocate in favor of usages that produce a better or more just world, this might be a reason to reject Kahane and Savulescu’s view, in favor of one that allows people to be disabled due to prejudice and/or in the absence of harms to well-being. Or at least, this will be so if the social and/or affirmational models of disability have the moral and political advantages proponents advertise for them.

Most philosophers who have considered the definition of disability in recent years have written in sympathy with either or both of the social or affirmational model of disability.

Elizabeth Barnes’s critique of definitional claims implicit in the social model has been a signal moment in the recent debate. Barnes is concerned that thinking of disability as a stigmatizing, oppressive, and exclusionary response to bodily difference does not distinguish disability from other properties grounded in responses to the body, like (on many accounts) race, gender, and sexual orientation identities.

Barnes develops an alternative view which still defines disability as a social property—but in a way that fits the affirmational model better than the definitions suggested by classic social models, doing away with the distinction between disability and impairment and making no direct reference whatsoever to injustice or disadvantage. Barnes (2016) proposes to define disability in terms of the judgments of disabled people themselves, not society as a whole. To wit, S is (physically) disabled if and only if:

• S is in some bodily state x ; [such that]
• The rules for making judgments about solidarity employed by the disability rights movement classify x in context C as among the physical conditions that they are seeking to promote justice for.

This makes who is disabled a social construction—dependent on the attitudes and commitments of a particular, self-identified group of people in contemporary society, the “disability rights movement”, composed of self-identified disabled and nondisabled members. It thus raises the concern that a disability movement might seek justice for the wrong people. Couldn’t some of those people complain that they should be included in the aims of that movement, precisely, because they are disabled? Barnes responds in two ways. The first is to note that she appeals to the rules for judgment-making, rather than judgments themselves; some people might not actually be included in the disability rights movement—say, because of internal prejudices on the part of those within the movement—but if this is inconsistent with the reasons for including others, then the excluded people will count as disabled too, on Barnes’ account. Still one might ask, what if the rules themselves were bad rules, wrongly but consistently excluding some people form the ambit of the struggle against ableism? Barnes, in response to this, rigidifies, insisting that we judge disability relative to the rules of the actual disability movement, even when we are imagining situations where that movement should use different rules than it actually does.

Some are not convinced by this last reply. For it can seem to give too much weight to judgments of the actual disability rights movement. As Jenkins and Webster point out, “rigidifying” to the actual world in this way means that imagining a world with a different disability rights movement isn’t imagining a world with different disabled people. But what if the disability rights movement is different there because social conditions are different, warranting a different set of rules for determining which people with pathologized bodily difference to seek justice for? And indeed isn’t there a sense in which “there” could be “here”? That is, couldn’t the disability right movement as it actually is, use rules that even when consistently applied lead it to seek justice for the wrong people (Wasserman 2018; Howard & Aas 2018; Lim 2018)?

This last concern can be generalized. Chong-min Lim, responding to Barnes, questions why the disability movement alone should have the authority to constitute disability. Where, we might ask, does this leave the experience of disabled people not part of the movement, or of those caregivers and/or non-disabled loved ones who advocate for them? And couldn’t the disability movement be overinclusive too, in principle, attempting to expand solidarity beyond what makes sense morally or politically. To address this problem (and in the process, expand the account to cover cognitive and other “non-physical” disabilities), Lim proposes that we make the following modification to Barnes’ account:

S , is disabled in context, C , if and only if:

• S is in some state, x ;
• x is constitutive, in C , of some constraint on S ’s legitimate interests;
• x is regarded, in C , as the subject of legitimate medical interest;
• the rules employed by the disability rights movement classify x in C as among the traits that they are seeking to promote progress and change for. (Lim 2018: 987)

Relative to Barnes, II and III are new restrictions, while IV is a substantially broadened version of the main clause of Barnes’ approach—in effect, broadening the relevant goals to include any improvement in the lives of putatively disabled people, whether that comes from social change or bodily transformation. Relatedly, III seems to bring back in medicalization—though now constrained by the requirement that the medical interest in question be “legitimate”, meaning, not apt in the traditional sense (not, concerned with pathology ) but rather just or right ; morally legitimate in light of whatever morally appropriate role medicine has to play in our society. Lim introduces these conditions to reflect the fact that expert communities outside of the disability rights movement have expertise relevant to constituting the disability population; parents or caregivers, even those not part of the movement itself, may have insight into whether and how a condition affects legitimate interests, while physicians will have important (though not exclusive) knowledge of which limitations on function are legitimately subject to medical interest.

The (intended) effect of Lim’s modifications, then, would be to limit the authority of the particular political judgments of the actual disability rights movement in determining who is disabled. This points to what may be a deeper problem for Barnes’ account, and the parts of Lim’s that follow her in making recognition by the rules that guide the disability movement determinative of disability. If the disability movement ought to adopt rules that pick out a certain group, isn’t that precisely because that group shares some other property, that makes that choice reasonable? That is, isn’t there something that those the disability rights movement share, that explains why they ought to seek justice in solidarity together? Wouldn’t that thing, whatever it is, make a better candidate definition of disability? To put the question for Lim’s account in particular: why would we want to deny that a condition is a disability, it if were a medically interesting constraint on legitimate interests, but not recognized as such by the rules of the disability rights movement?

Howard and Aas (2018) respond to Barnes in a different way, developing a definition that harkens back to the classic social model of disability. Building on the work of Sally Haslanger (2000) on gender and race, they define disability classically as a certain sort of social response to impairment. On their view, person S is disabled in a context C , iff

• S is in some bodily or psychological state x [such that]
• x is regularly assumed in the ideology in C to involve an impairment: a dysfunctional bodily state that limits a major life activity, and
• in the dominant ideology of C , that someone in x has an impairment explains why they can be appropriately pitied, stigmatized, and excluded from socially valued activities and statuses.
• The fact that S is in this state plays a role in S ’s systemic disadvantage: that is, (i)–(iii) actually explains why S is involuntarily excluded from certain valued activities or relegated to a marginal status along some significant social dimension. (2018: 1128–1129)

Impairment is critical on this analysis. Disability is distinct from other bodily-based social categories on this definition precisely because it is a response, of a certain distinctive sort, to social perception about bodily properties, namely impairment . Race, gender, and orientation identity would be different (thought possibly overlapping) responses to different (again, possibly overlapping) bodily properties. Howard and Aas do not, however, defend the biological reality of impairment; it suffices for their account that society itself employs some notion of biological abnormality or insufficiency, saying with the classic social model that disability is a matter of being classified as impaired, and excluded on that basis.

Barnes (2018) responds that, because of this last feature, this account does not after all give sufficiently central place to bodily difference. In particular, she thinks it makes it hard to see how the bodily differences characteristic of disability could be, as the affirmation model has it, something to be proud of. They are, after all, picked out negatively, by reference to disadvantage and social exclusion. Bodily features picked out for their role in the struggle for disability justice seem to be a better candidate source of joy, identification, and pride. The success of Barnes’ response depends on how exactly disability pride is supposed to work, and on how exactly definitions like these are supposed to serve the interests of the struggle against injustice. Among other things, reflection on related cases involving racialized body features suggests that it is possible to take pride in something that others respond to in oppressive and stigmatizing ways. On this understanding, the pride is not in the oppression, but in the oppression-triggering feature itself or in a skillful or solidaristic response to oppression.

Jenkins and Webster (2021) propose a different sort of social-construct definition of disability—or actually, three different but closely related definitions. Like Barnes, Howard, and Aas, they are interested in understanding what bodily differences are centrally relevant to disability. But they cleave closer to the human variation model than the minority group model in understanding these differences. Their key notion is what they call marginalized functioning : having a body that does not work in the way that our socially constructed world expects. Each of their three definitions of disability presuppose this notion; to wit:

MF1 : A subject S is [physically] disabled if they have marginalized functioning relative to a context, C , where this is the case iff:

• there is a set of social norms N , comprising \(n_1,\) \(n_2,\) …\(n_n,\) each of which serves as a default for the purposes of constructing common social environments and structuring common social interactions in C ; and
• there is some norm in N , \(n_x,\) such that S cannot physically function in a way that satisfies it. (2021: 8)

It might seem that this account, and indeed Howard and Aas’s, implies that there could be no disability in a just society. Though this is a classic claim of the traditional British social model of disability (UPIAS 1976), some find it implausible. Note, however, that neither of these views in fact implies the impossibility of disability in a just society (even if their language sometimes suggests it). For neither view, in itself, implies that the social responses that constitute most disabled people as such are necessarily unjust (though surely all four authors would agree that in the actual world, they usually are). If it is morally legitimate to set society up in a way that is designed for the functioning of most but not all its members—and it may well be, given how costly it would be to get anywhere near complete and comprehensive inclusion (Barclay 2018)—then some forms of functioning could be marginalized or be a source of disadvantage, even in a just society. And, thus, those that function in those marginalized ways, could be disabled.

A more significant prima facie concern for MF1 is that it seems to include amongst the disabled people with merely transitory mismatch between body and society—say, someone who broke one or both arms, and therefore cannot open doors or otherwise do what society expects people to be, physically, able to do. These people do not normally identify and are not normally identified as disabled. To capture this, Jenkins and Webster propose that we might move, simply, to:

MF2: someone is disabled in a context if and only if they have lasting marginalized functioning in that context; OR

MF3: someone is disabled in a context if and only if they experience disability-characteristic oppression because they have marginalized functioning in that context

MF2 solves the problem of temporary conditions by stipulation. This may or may not be good enough here, depending on whether we think temporary conditions (e.g., post-concussion syndrome or pregnancy) can be disabilities. MF3 faces some of the same problems as other social-model-inspired definitions—particularly, that it seems to define disability in terms of a kind of oppression, and therefore in terms of something bad, something that is therefore (arguably) difficult to be proud of or happy about. Further, by requiring that oppression be caused by functioning that actually fails to fit going norms and expectations, it does not clearly classify as disabled people who are disadvantaged by false perceptions regarding their bodily differences—again, failing to follow the ADA in its well-considered inclusion of people “regarded as”, but not, impaired, in its definition of disability (Francis 2018). It remains to be seen whether the advantages of this definition are great enough to justify excluding such “regarded” as people as disabled.

In their influential book From Chance to Choice , Buchanan, Brock, Daniels, and Wikler (2000) propose the following definition, meant as an explication of the legal and policy decisions considered above.

To have a disability is to be unable to perform some significant range of tasks or functions that individuals in someone’s reference group (e.g., adults) are ordinarily able to do, at least under favorable conditions, where the inability is not due to simple and easily corrigible ignorance or to lack of the tools or means ordinarily available for performing such tasks or functions. (2000: 286)

This defines disability colloquially, in terms of ability; disability is, roughly, an unusual inability. Barnes and others object, however, that this definition is too broad. It seems to make it the case, for instance, that someone who cannot “roll their tongue” or do mental subtraction is disabled; since most people can do this under favorable conditions. Conversely, this sort of view also seems to undergenerate disabilities, since some (fibromyalgia or depression for instance), only make it more difficult to do things, without making any particular task or function straightforwardly unachievable. And it is not entirely clear how this account avoids the obviously problematic implication that identity categories like race, gender, and sexual orientation imply disability; someone subject to social prejudice in virtue of their gender or the color of their skin might be, for that reason, unable to do things others can do.

Alex Gregory (2020) takes a different approach to defining disability in terms of inability:

The Inability Theory: To be disabled is to be less able to do something than is typical, where this degree of inability is partly explained by features of your body that are atypical. (2020: 26)

This definition of disability brings the body into the definition, but it is meant to be neutral between more-medical and more-social ways of seeing disability. “Atypical” features need not be “abnormal” in a medicalizing sense; they are simply different, not necessarily worse. To say that an inability that comes to disability must be at least partly explained by bodily features is consistent, both, with saying that it is entirely explained by them (a la the medical model) and that it is also partly explained by social factors. This in itself rejects the medical model as a general claim, as well as the less nuanced statements of the social model, that would definitionally exclude non-social inabilities from the ambit of “disability”.

The initial statement of the Inability Theory would still seem to be overinclusive; someone who cannot get a good job because of the color of their skin, or marry the person they love because of their sexual orientation, has an atypical inability explained by an atypical bodily feature. To rule these cases out, Gregory moves to:

The Final Inability Theory: To be disabled is to be less able to do something than is typical, where this degree of inability (1) is partly explained by features of your body that are atypical, and (2) is not explained by anyone’s attitudes toward those bodily features. (2020: 33)

This does plausibly avoid the problem of classifying sexual and racialized minorities at least as disabled; any inability engendered by color of skin is explained entirely by prejudicial attitudes. (Or so it may seem; more below). But in the process it also raises a recurring problem—where an atypical feature is only inability-generating because of attitudes specifically about whether it is inability-generating . If people think that people with, say, Down syndrome, cannot benefit from education, they will not be educated; when they do not develop the skills they could have developed, that lack of skill is, then, explained by a combination of atypical bodily features and attitudes towards those features. It can seem plausible to say, with the ADA, that discrimination rooted in a pathologized understanding of a trait is a kind of disability discrimination.

Moreover, this analysis also raises some of the same concerns as those Barnes and others pressed against Buchanan et alia ’s explication of disability as biologically abnormal limitation. For here even more than there it seemed like not every limitation on ability, not even every one explained by atypicality or abnormality, is a disability properly-so-called. Gregory, however, has a novel response here—insisting that these are, really, disabilities, but just not normally worth calling attention to as “disabilities”, since the aptness of this ascription in conversational context depends on the significance of the abilities at issue.

This proposal raises other problems, however.. Recall race and sexual orientation. A person with light-colored skin cannot work in even relatively moderate sun all day without getting a sunburn. Someone with exclusively same-sex orientation cannot have procreative sex with someone for whom they have romantic and sexual feelings. These are inabilities explained by bodily difference, not by attitudes, and they are not insignificant or trivial ones: yet it seems they are not disabilities, not even a little bit.

Why not? The social constructionist views considered above would give one kind of answer—pointing to the facts that (depending on the view):

• the disability rights movement is rationally unconcerned with properties like race and orientation; or
• that race and orientation are not targeted by ableist ideology for exclusion and stigmatization; or
• that our actual social norms do not marginalize these configurations of bodily function, in the way they marginalize paradigm impairments.

An alternative, more positive approach, which remains focused squarely on ability, would hold that these inabilities, like the minor inabilities considered above, are not relevant to disability because their absence does not place claims on others, in justice. To wit, Jessica Begon (2021)

Thus, I define disability as the restriction in the ability to perform those tasks human beings are entitled to be able to perform as a matter of justice, as the result of the interaction between an individual’s impairment, their social and political context, and the resources they have available to them. (2021: 936–937)

It turns out that by impairment Begon simply means “atypical or unusual functioning”, not pathological or life-limiting functioning; so, this account is actually structurally more similar to Gregory’s than to Buchanan et alia. The difference is that the specific absence of ability that constitutes a disability is the atypicality-caused absence of abilities we ought to have , or anyway that our societies ought to provide for us.

This account has a natural response to the problems of non-disability inabilities. No one is entitled to roll their tongue (at least in any social environment remotely like our own); thus, nobody is disabled because they cannot do so. Nor, in most circumstances, are we entitled to sit unprotected all day in the sun without paying the consequences. We might be entitled to protection by sunscreen, or to the opportunity to escape the sun, but we are not entitled to have the ability to withstand the sun if we choose to forgo these protections. Similarly, it seems plausible to deny that anyone is entitled to procreate sexually with their romantic partner; there may be entitlements to become a parent, perhaps even a genetic parent, but they need not be realized in this way. Thus, Begon’s account appears at first glance not to overgenerate disabilities, as other inability-based accounts seem to.

That said, the account still faces some of the problems we see with other ability-limitation-based accounts. The non-pathologizing sense of impairment as “functional difference” may not in the end be specific enough to distinguish disability from other kinds of unjust absence of ability. Begon addresses this in the case of sex difference, arguing—in effect, with Boorse—that differences in the “reference class” or appropriate functional norms applying to males and females of the species make for differences in what counts as an impairment between males and females. So, for instance, an inability to get a good-paying job resulting from possession of the capacity to menstruate is not a disability, because that capacity is not atypical for female human beings . Such a way to address the problem may not cover all forms of oppression since much oppression seems to be evoked by differences that are functional in some sense—sexual orientation relates to the function of our dispositions to sexual attraction; absence of athletic ability (within the normal range) to the function of the musculature; even pigmentation, to the function of the epidermis in protecting the organism from the environment.

Begon’s view could avoid classifying inabilities down to these differences by further multiplication of “reference class”, so that, say, being unable to get a job because you are gay is not a disability because gay people function typically “for gay people”. But as Elselijn Kingma has argued, in response to similar maneuvers in the health literature, this kind of specificity seems problematically arbitrary—in the limit, threatening to trivialize the relevant notion of “functional typicality” (Kingma 2007). These concerns seem to press back in the direction of Lim’s restriction of disability to responses to “medically significant interests”, or Howard and Aas’s definition in terms of traits perceived or represented as functional deficits in the reigning biomedical ideology.

There are also questions about how we are to understand the set of entitlements relevant to determining when the absence of ability is unjust. Begon discusses these issues only briefly (2021: 954, n30); a more fully developed version of the view would have to do more. It seems important to abstract from resource constraints, since we would not want to say that someone is only disabled if habilitating them is cost-effective relative to other priorities justice gives us, given what resources we happen to have. But this abstraction threatens to make too many of us disabled, since justice might, absent resource constraints, give us powerful reasons to enable one another to do all sorts of things—to give those of below-average height the ability to dunk a basketball, say; or to give women well-past childbearing age the ability to conceive and gestate children. Perhaps we should do these things in response to these functional atypicalities; that does not make people disabled, until we are rich enough to do them.

Two sorts of skeptical responses have greeted the effort to define disabilities as individual traits, conditions, or functions, selected by some set of rules or criteria. The first critique is inspired by the work of Michael Foucault on biopower as a form of control exercised by modern states over the bodies of their populations (Tremain 2017). This critique argues that to focus on individual characteristics in defining disability is to miss the forest for the trees. “Disability” refers not to a set of individual characteristics, or to a concept that encompasses such a set, but to a mechanism that identifies various types of individual characteristics for the purpose of social control. Notably, Shelley Tremain analyzes disability as a mechanism constructed and maintained by laws, informal norms, cultural understandings and other exercises of biopower. Impairments and disabilities only exist within this culturally and historically contingent apparatus that arose in part as a means for people who saw themselves as “normal” to regulate those they labeled as “deviants”.

[D]isability is not a metaphysical substrate, a natural, biological category, or a characteristic that only certain individuals embody or possess, but rather is a historically contingent network of force relations in which everyone is implicated and entangled and in relation to which everyone occupies a position. That is, to be disabled or non-disabled is to occupy a certain subject position within the productive constraints of the apparatus of disability…. (2017: 22).

At first glance, Tremain’s Foucauldian claim can seem to be talking past the interlocutors considered above; no more a distinctive analysis of disability to compete with the foregoing than was Foucault’s famous claim that “knowledge is power” a competitor to Plato’s or Goldman’s or Sosa’s analytic definitions of knowledge (see entry on the analysis of knowledge ). As in that case, however, a recognition of the role the concept of disability plays in reproducing unjust social conditions can cast doubt on reliability of the commonsense judgments and linguistic intuitions appealed to by rival analytic definitions. Such judgments and intuitions are, so the Foucauldian could argue, products of the apparatus, not an independent basis for assessing or understanding its assignment of positions. However, several of the analytic accounts discussed in the preceding action were developed with awareness of and due skepticism towards the ideological roots of prevailing convictions about disability and do not explain disability as a natural, biological category. It is unclear then, if a Foucauldian challenge could undermine the evidence used to develop these accounts.

The second critique, rather than dismiss the value of philosophical definitions, emphasizes their multiplicity, maintaining that different definitions are appropriate in different contexts and for different purposes. On this view, the problem with these definitions is that they see themselves as competitors in pursuing a goal that is both unattainable and undesirable: a single unified or core definition of disability:

Many philosophical disagreements about disability simply overlook the fact that the disputants are talking about different phenomena (impairment vs. oppression; care vs. justice; legal vs. extra-legal obligations, etc.). Some of those disagreements are more productively articulated as disagreements on how to handle the polysemy of disability. (Beaudry 2020: 5; see also Beaudry 2016).

Though certain ethical or political contexts might call for specifying or stipulating a definition, this view holds that we have little reason to think we can find, or should seek, a definition of “disability” as a general matter. We are unlikely to find one because these different definitions will have conceptual and practical advantages in different contexts; we should not seek one because adopting a canonical definition would foreclose our recognition of other characteristics and phenomena with moral and practical affinities to what we have decided to call “disabilities”. An open-ended approach, in contrast, “can create avenues for new kinds of emancipatory self-understandings” (Beaudry 2020: 13).

Beaudry acknowledges that even open-ended approaches have evidentiary constraints, but these constraints are far looser than any which a single definition, however nuanced and complex, would impose:

Disability remains a term that at least denotes or connotes “abnormal embodiments”, including phenomena entirely external to the bodies of “disabled persons” (such as prejudices directed at imagined abnormal embodiments or strictly cultural artifacts). It is a useful commonality between a constellation of discourses that relate to objects that are at least united by this family resemblance and may overlap or interact with each other, even though it is unlikely that a “master theory” would neatly choreograph all such interactions. (Beaudry 2020: 17)

This deflationary pluralism, however, arguably overlooks the value of continuing to seek a single unified or core definition of disability, however unlikely we are to agree on one. Most philosophers who have taken this tack do so not on the supposition that “disability” or even “impairment” are natural kinds—objective properties that legal and regulatory definitions ought to track. Rather, they are largely motivated by a belief that there is a set of personal experiences and social responses that people with disabilities have in common, and that ways of precisifying the meaning of “disability” and “impairment” are likely to work better than others for purposes of framing policies and building political movements to address the needs and claims of individuals those sharing such personal experiences and aimed at addressing the moral and political of this group.

Whether and to what extent the practical aims these various models of disability seek to serve are best accomplished by many separate contextual definitions, or one sophisticated one is, in the final analysis itself likely to be a difficult ethical, even political, question. Proponents of social constructionist, ameliorative views of disability, like proponents of similar views of race and gender, have tended to think that there are good practical reasons to define these notions broadly, to draw attention to forms of injustice that many experience, together, as a means for building larger and thus more powerful coalition to push for positive change. And they have, or anyway could, argue that the flexibility and inclusiveness pluralist call for can be accommodated by an open-minded and sensitive debate over just what this one solidaristic definition should or should not include. They might be right, or they might be wrong, but if they are wrong, it is not because the philosophical and political project of offering a unifying definition is a priori misguided.

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disability: and health care rationing | disability: and justice | disability: health, well-being, personal relationships | feminist philosophy, topics: perspectives on disability | feminist philosophy, topics: perspectives on sex and gender | health | knowledge: analysis of | Molyneux’s problem | self-knowledge

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291 Disability Essay Topic Ideas & Examples

🏆 best disability topic ideas & essay examples, 👍 good essay topics on disability, ✅ simple & easy disability essay titles, 💡 most interesting disability topics to write about, 🎓 good research topics about disability, ⭐ interesting topics to write about disability, ❓ research questions about disabilities.

• Case Study of a Child with Intellectual Disability It is crucial to integrate the input of a learning coach into the school curriculum to encourage the participation of Meagan’s parents in his educational endeavors.
• Poems with Disabilities by Jim Ferris This is good evidence for the argument of the need to eliminate the issue of ableism. Language evolves gradually, and countering the issue of ableism is a long-term goal.
• Computer-Based Technologies That Assist People With Disabilities The visually impaired To assist the visually impaired to use computers, there are Braille computer keyboards and Braille display to enable them to enter information and read it. Most of these devices are very expensive […]
• Children With Learning Disabilities The following research questions will be used in achieving the objectives: What is the role of learning disabilities in affecting the ability of the students to learn?
• Managing Students With Disabilities Instructional issues that are encountered in education are those arising due to the inability of the students to acquire, maintain, and relate the skills that are learned in class to other settings within and outside […]
• Sociocultural Barriers for People With Disabilities On the other hand, stigmatization, stereotyping and prejudice have been highlighted as the barriers to social inclusion of people with disabilities in society.
• Disability is not Inability: A Different Perspective The Tourette’s syndrome is a condition that affects the normal functions of both the body and the mind of an individual, hence causing them to do or utter inappropriate things given the circumstances and environment.
• Importance of the Social Model of Disability For instance, the public perceives people with disabilities as dependents and burdens to their families and communities. Conclusively, the model suggests solutions that rectify the problems witnessed in the modern and disabling world to remove […]
• Children With Disabilities in Education By the end of the experiment the student will demonstrate his ability to understand the information, to discuss it, and to reflect his ideas in writing.
• Disability: Coping and Adjustment By applying a combination pf psychodynamic and behavioral theories to the management of the patient’s perception of themselves in a new setting and with the restrictions imposed on them due to their disability.
• The Problems of Children With Disabilities and Possible Ways of Solution It is very important for disabled people to be on the same level with others in the conditions that compensate the deviations in the development and constraints of the abilities in learning.
• Reading Disability The visual and verbal response of children with reading disability is also very poor and in the process affects their manipulation of sounds. One of the best interventions for children with reading disabilities is to […]
• Women, Development and Disabilities The mission of the organization is to enhance the voice of women in society and influence other organizations that advocate for women rights.
• Intellectual Disability Considerations The best way to help an intellectually disabled individual is through developing interest in learning more about what intellectual disability entails.
• Learning Disabilities: Differentiating ADHD and EBD As for the most appropriate setting, it is possible to seat the child near the teacher. It is possible to provide instructions with the help of visual aids.
• Constructivism Theory for Adolescents with Disabilities The key component of the theory is people’s interaction with the environment. Therefore, Vygotsky’s theory is effective in developing the social and academic skills of an adolescent with learning and behavior disabilities.
• Interview on Permanent Disability due to an Accidental Injury He also said that forgiving was the best way to free oneself from anger and that it helps in the recovery process. In the beginning, it was difficult for him to accept.
• Intellectual Disability and Inclusiveness Therefore, the existence of inclusive strategies and the creation of an emotionally friendly environment with participation in group practices is crucial for the happy life of people with ID.
• Students With Disabilities: Research Analysis In the process of undertaking this research and practical alignment, there is a misalignment in the inclusion of students with disabilities in the GE class.
• Ableism: Bias Against People With Disabilities People concerned with rights advocacy ought to ensure a facilitated awareness of the distressing impacts of ableism through the inclusion of the subject in private and public discussions.
• Culturally Responsive Teaching of Students With Disabilities Cultural Responsive teaching is a teaching technique used to identify and address cognitive, social, emotional, and cultural and language needs of students with developmental needs as a way of providing them with assistance in all […]
• Defining Disabilities in Modern World Defining disability has not been easy due to the various opinions related to the understanding of the concept. Disability has significant impact on the society due to the relationships that exists between the individual and […]
• The Experience of Parents of Children With Disabilities Enhancing support for the mental well-being of parents of children with a disability: developing a resource based on the perspectives of parents and professionals.
• United Arab Emirates Schools: Students With Learning Disabilities The current UAE public school environment does not allow for the provision of the necessary skills due to the lack of a proper teaching strategy.
• Daily Living Skills Training for Individuals With Learning Disabilities Teaching individuals with physical and mental disabilities the life skills needed to compensate for their disadvantages are considered to be the key factor to ensuring a relatively safe, functional, and happy life for those individuals.
• The Definition of Disability in Clare’s “Freaks and Queers” These words, in the view of the author, can be used as a disguise or as weapons, and the queer and disabled are capable of taking them from the abusers and use them to build […]
• Psychological Testing of Intellectual Disabilities Speaking of its psychometric properties, the PCL-5 is a valid and reliable self-report measure for the assessment and quantifying symptoms of PTSD.
• Current Trends and Issues in Educating Students With Disabilities Following the existence of cases of racial and ethnic bias across the United States educational system, the government has seen the importance to intervene in improving education in the U.S.
• Amundson on Hedonic Psychology, Disability, and Life Quality To facilitate the introduction of a new concept to the field of psychology, Amundson makes a sound decision to specify the essence of the standard view, according to which other definitions and comparisons can be […]
• Learning Disability and Special Educators’ Duties In conclusion, the case study provides the story of Larissa, a young El Salvadorian girl who is disabled because of learning disabilities such as reading and writing.
• Rights of Young Women With Intellectual Disability in the US Since most primary care physicians lack experience and education, the barriers to adequate medical care for adults with intellectual disabilities are being strengthened in sexual health, a sensitive topic for people with and without disabilities. […]
• Autism and Disability Advocacy People with autism can contribute to the diversity of disability culture by expanding understanding of what disability is and how it can be accepted.
• People With Disabilities in the Frida Movie After the accident, her father bought her a canvas that she would use for painting because she loved art and was an artist, helping her cope with her disability.
• Safety Evacuation for People with Disabilities First, before a disaster occurs, the government should be aware of the number of individuals in the scenario and keep track of them to verify the figures are correct.
• Individuals With Disabilities: Prejudice and Discrimination I researched that people with persistent medical or physical disorders, such as cerebral palsy or multiple sclerosis, who have speech, articulation, or communication impairments, for example, are sometimes seen as having an intellectual deficiency. Corey […]
• Special Olympics and Profound Intellectual and Multiple Disabilities Together with partners, the Special Olympics aspires to improve the health outcomes for people with physical and mental disabilities to close the gap with the healthy population who are more advantaged in terms of access […]
• Abortion of a Fetus With Disability It is worth paying attention to the fact that it is precise because of such things that terminations of pregnancy occur so that a person does not come into contact with obvious prejudices still actively […]
• The Ohio Department of Developmental Disabilities Policy The paper outlines the proper policy and procedure of incident reporting and investigation and thus, provides how to become an agent for the Ohio Department of Developmental Disabilities and satisfy individuals receiving services.
• Sports Can Improve the Psychological Well-Being of People with Disability Maresova et al.maintain that viewing the self as a bother and worthless leads to psychosomatic challenges among numerous people with disabilities.
• Ohio Department of Developmental Disabilities’ Staff Training Specifically, the introduction of the assessment modules for the evaluation of the staff members’ compliance with the set requirements will be enacted.
• The Quality of the Working Environment for Persons With Disabilities The progressive introduction of new practices more tolerant of the disabled will be carried out at every stage of the work cycle and in every segment of the corporation as a connected infrastructure.
• Developmental Disabilities: Best Practice and Support Family therapy and the creation of support groups seem to be an effective method for children with disabilities and their environment.
• Bronx Developmental Disabilities Council: Organization Assessment During events, council, and committee meetings, the organization provides printed materials with information on disability and the prevention of social distancing of people with disabilities.
• Assistive Technologies for Individuals with Disabilities A rehabilitation consultant will be able to recommend this equipment to people who are acutely worried about the inability to use a computer and the Internet to ensure a comfortable life.
• Addressing Intellectual Disability Disorder Epidemic The process of child growth is different in diverse parts of the world, and depending on the cultural values and language, children can create their specific beliefs and way of living.
• Smart Farms Hiring People with Disabilities Although Smart Farms is a non-profit organization and benefits from donations, the workers play their role in income generation by working on the farms and sales.
• Traumatic Brain Injury: Chronic Illness and Disability The most common cause of a traumatic brain injury is a severe blow to the head or body. He is confined to a wheelchair and is under the care of a full-time caregiver.Mr.
• Instruments to Assess People’s Health, Disability, and Quality of Life In conclusion, it is possible to present the strengths and limitations of the instrument under analysis. Now, it is rational to comment on the primary strengths and limitations of the instrument.
• Americans with Disabilities Act and Nursing Practice Acts such as the Americans with Disabilities Act affect not only the political and legal environment in a country but also the rights and responsibilities of nurses.
• Inequalities in African Women and Disability Studies The problem is that African women are subjected to a higher risk of sexual abuse and illnesses than females of other nationalities.
• Abortion on the Grounds of Disability Removing a fetus from the woman’s womb results in death which is contrary to the morals of the community that is against killing.
• Reasonable Accommodation for the People with Disability A reasonable accommodation in the recruiting process is a change in the nature of the job or the work context that allows a person with a disability to qualify for the position while still having […]
• Life of Individuals Dealing with Disabilities The child’s image hitting the t-ball also showcased a powerful issue, that disabled individuals should be treated similarly to other people and given equal opportunities to give them the chance to perform optimally.
• Partnership for People with Disabilities’ Mission The mission of this organization is to partner with stakeholders both in the intellectual and developmental disability community and other interested groups at Virginia Commonwealth University. The organization was founded in 1985 to better people’s […]
• Diabetes Mellitus as Leading Cause of Disability The researchers used data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, where more than 12% of older people in the US live with the condition.
• Disability Programs and Their Funding Issues The public has to promote programs for people with disabilities to address the challenges that they and their families may encounter, and everyone should strive to overcome those challenges as a part of the community.
• Healthcare Disparities in People With Disabilities In addition to health care disparities, such as poor access to care, including preventive one, and dependency, people with disabilities also face higher morbidity and lack of insurance.
• Employment for People With Disabilities Accommodation is also considered to be a restructuring of work and the attraction of other personnel to help in adaptation – as it should have happened with Adele.
• Media and Disability Journal Responses During the study of the literature, it was revealed that in boarding schools, professionals who thoroughly know the features of the disease do not always take care of the child.
• Laws Protecting the Rights of People With Disabilities The aim of this essay is to research the law that protects the rights of people with disabilities in the context of sporting events.
• Disability-Adjusted Life Years in the US and India Therefore, the main contrasts are evident in the ratio of non-communicable and infectious diseases, a greater variety of non-communicable illnesses in the US, and a considerable impact of drugs on the lives of American citizens.
• People With Disabilities in Society I think that these people are powerful and inspiring, as they prove to the world that it is possible to live life to the fullest with a disability.
• Real Magazine Exhibiting Disability Artworks The organization aims to provide their help in selling the paintings and other products to provide the participants with the necessary confidence and support in the realization of the incentive.
• People With Disabilities and Social Work Moreover, there is a tendency towards the rise in the number of such people because of the deterioration of the situation and the growing number of environmental concerns.
• Provision of Quality Services to People With Disability Provision of quality services to persons with disabilities entails addressing the environmental and attitudinal hurdles created by the community, which impede the autonomy and contribution of persons with disabilities.
• Alternate Assessments for Students With Learning Disabilities The problem is that many school districts experience difficulties with proposing adequate formative and summative assessments for those students who require special attention.
• People with Disabilities’ Problem of Employment Although truck driving can be a stressful job, it is not evident if it is true, and thus, it is important for John to experience the job-related himself and determine whether he can handle it. […]
• Lawsuits Regarding College Students With Disabilities Abuse is one of the factors considered to have discouraged physically challenged students from pursuing their academic careers.
• Living with Disabilities in the Nondisabled World A variety of laws, initiatives, and regulations are currently implemented to ensure simpler and less costly access to information resources and the functionality of a device.
• Living with Disabilities from an Insider’s Perspective Additionally, Armendariz was able to use a prosthetic arm to assist with her disability which she recalled as being helpful before it led to severe negativity from her peers at the time.
• Disability Hate Crimes in England and Wales An estimated 19% of the population in England and Wales is disabled, and the scale and scope of DHC are grossly underreported since over half of all the incidences go unreported.
• Workplace and People With Disabilities The purpose of the research is to make coherent and accurate observations in regards to the usefulness of the given method in improving the overall attitudes of people and organizations toward people with disabilities.
• Disability Studies as an Academic Discipline By focusing on medical and social constructs of disability, disability studies tend to be multidisciplinary, intersecting the humanities and social sciences.
• Career Counseling for People With Disabilities To sufficiently research, the issue of career counseling for individuals with disabilities in the academic press, a list of journals that offer such information was developed.
• Impairment Pain Management and Disability Equality The purpose of the policy is to examine approaches to pain management to ensure disability equality. The first method is a formalized approach to pain management, assessment, and frequent reassessment/ monitoring of the patient’s state.
• Genetic Modification and Implicit Bias Against People With Disabilities There is also a factor of disabilities that are life-threatening to a child, or illnesses that may be able to be fatal within the first few years of life.
• Impact of Social Darwinism on the Perception of Human Disabilities In addition, connecting behavior such as the likeliness of criminality to genetics is incorrect and damaging not only to the individual but to a community and society as a whole.
• The Social Model of Disability From the examples given, it is evident that disability exists because people with impairments are forced to live in a world that is not accessible to them.
• Music Therapy for Children With Learning Disabilities This review includes the evidence supporting music therapy as an effective strategy for promoting auditory, communication, and socio-emotional progression in children with ASD.
• History of Disability and Institutionalisation The legacy of oppression for the disabled still exists in many institutions despite the anti-discrimination legislation supporting their participation in the community’s social and economic life.
• Religious Impact on Disability Experience Faith significantly impacts the experience of disability through the salient religious teachings about the meaning and nature of disabilities. However, according to religion, the primary purpose of disability is to enable the society to learn […]
• Healthcare Professionals: Individuals With Developmental Disabilities The presentation provide an overview of relevant health related issues in individuals with developmental disabilities and how it relates to the group of professionals assigned.
• Short-Term Disability Benefits To sum up, when an employee asks for short-term disability leave, if the firm has a contract with an insurance company, the HR manager should begin by contacting their representatives to investigate the situation.
• Relation Between Disability and Health The analysis of descriptive epidemiological and demographical data is an opportunity to learn more about the distribution of disabilities among Americans and the problems related to the lack of education and health promotion programs.
• Impairment and Social Perceptions: Disability However, there is a need to understand each debate’s value in the context of how they affect the general productivity and social developments of people in communities.
• Health Practitioner Practice: Disability Of great importance in this theoretical study is the impact of aging as well as some of the prevalent factors that affect their condition. Vividly, it is worth noting that the level of disability varies […]
• Protection for Persons With Disabilities and Their Service Animals Additionally, it must be trained to give assistance to a person with disability. Service animals that can be selected to assist persons with disability must be either a dog or a miniature horse.
• Intellectual Disability: Autism In their adulthood, and because of the communication issues that most individuals with autism tend to have, they will naturally have difficulty in finding and keeping jobs.
• Death Penalty: Juveniles and Mental Disabilities Consequently, the Eight Amendment should dismiss the death penalty for this category and state laws must implement recommendations of the National Alliance on Mental Illness, the American Psychological Association, and the American Bar Association that […]
• Limitations and Disability in Multiple Sclerosis The data collected contained demographic information such as the gender, age, hypertension and diabetes mellitus history, and the current usage of prescribed medication among the participants.
• Lifelong Disability and United Nations Convention In this report, I will aim to discuss the discursive significance of UNCRPD, to identify the qualitative aspects of how UNCRPD relates to the themes and motifs, contained in the ‘Labor of love’ video, and […]
• National Disability Insurance Scheme Implementation This paper explores the economic, political, sociological, epidemiological public health factors affecting the implementation of the NDIS, and their effect on the health policy in response to the growing needs of the community.
• The Prevalence, Effects and Challenges of Developmental Disabilities While the increase in the number of people with developmental disabilities is attributed to the rising numbers of the aging population, disabilities may arise in childhood and affect the entire lives of people.
• Disability, Handicap and the Environment: Amundsen’s Argument The limitation appears to follow easily from the reality that disabilities entail species-atypical operation together with the fact that species-typical operation is an efficient way of procuring the products present in the environment in which […]
• Community Disability Awareness Program: Elderly Women With Disabilities A measurable outcome in the program’s success will be a decline in the rate of crime related to elderly women with disabilities.
• The Understanding of Needs of People With Learning Disabilities Despite several problems in the overall design of the strategy that can be used to improve the nursing services for PLD, Drozd and Clinch make a very valid point by stressing the significance of a […]
• Addressing the Needs of People With Learning Disabilities As a student aiming at becoming a Nurse Practitioner, I am currently focusing on the exploration of the options for managing the work of the nursing staff, as well as seeking the opportunities for improving […]
• Judicial Conduct and Disability Act Controversy The following paper addresses the Act from the perspective of its constitutionality, the measures applicable to judges caught in misconduct and the terms of judges’ removal, as well as the terms of appointment.
• Tax Eligibility and Disability Payment Another reason is that the injury he suffers occurred during his service in the army as an employee of the state.
• “Compounding Mental and Cognitive Disability” by Baldry and Dowse A justification of the statement as briefed in the article is that most of the mentally and cognitive disabled individuals have a higher rate of contact with police officers throughout their lives.
• Elderly Women with Disabilities: Problems and Needs Despite the economic crisis, the cost of medical care has also increased due to the rise in the number of lawsuits filed against the physicians of the state.
• Relationship Satisfaction and Psychological Well-Being Among Greek People With Physical Disabilities In the light of this lack of knowledge, the present study attempts to explore the degree of relationship satisfaction in connection with the way handicapped people deal with the challenges of romantic involvement, as well […]
• Understanding of Disability According to the World Health Organization, impairment refers to any problem that affects the functioning of the body or the body structure, limitation in doing an activity refers to the difficulty that results from an […]
• Communication and People With Disabilities The bathrooms were close to the food court; moreover, there were special handle bars which helped to transfer to the commode and, at this, the height of the commode was almost the same as the […]
• Disability Equality of a Disabled Lone Parent Although the officials were initially reluctant owing to her physical condition and the nature of work she was to perform, they allowed her to try.
• Music Therapy as a Related Service for Students With Disabilities From a neuroscientific perspective, how would music intervention improve classroom behaviors and academic outcomes of students with ADHD as a way to inform policy-makers of the importance of music therapy as a related service?
• Professional Practice in Aged Care and Disability The organization has to work with its customers on a partnership level by including them in the planning and assessment of their care.
• The National Disability Insurance Scheme: The Issue of Financing Professionals working within the sphere of Aged Care and Disability Services have to collaborate with many organizations in order to ensure that their clients and patients receive the most benefits from the system.
• National Disability Insurance Scheme The development of NDIS is conditional upon the existence of specific issues related to the provision of healthcare services to disabled people.
• Problem Behaviors in Intellectual Disabilities Community The proposed quality designed study will evaluate the behavior of people with intellectual disabilities over a certain period of time and consequently conclude the primary triggers that influence ID people to demonstrate behavioral issues, including […]
• Sutherland Leisure Center: Professional Practice in Aged Care and Disability Thus, for example, the consideration of Parkinson’s disease by the owner of Sutherland Leisure Center would allow it to benefit from a higher degree of satisfaction of people with this condition.
• Law for People With Disabilities in California The family, the immediate environment of a person with disabilities, is the main link in the system of his or her care, socialization, the satisfaction of needs, support, and career guidance.
• The Resilience Experiences of People With Disabilities The focus of the study was on the participants’ lived experiences, as well as their attitudes towards certain aspects, so the use of interviews as a data collection method is justified.
• Disability and Murder by Caregivers The study of the situation of the family of a person with disabilities in the social structure of society and the possibilities of social mobility is a special section of the disability problem.
• Culturally Aware: Chinese Americans’ Views on Disability Prior to considering the perspectives of the Chinese concerning disability, it is useful to examine the incidence of this health issue among Asian people and some of its peculiarities.
• Intellectual Disability: Causes and Roles Diagnostics needs to be carried out, and a problem in the development of thinking should be revealed with the help of different methods.
• Literature Circles for Students With Learning Disabilities On the other hand, the affected individuals contend that the categorization should be removed to pave the way for the integration of assistances where all needs are attended without classification regardless of the student’s physical […]
• Vocational Expert on Disability Claims While representing a client, an expert has to identify the level of disability of his client and other available jobs in the company.
• School Counselors for Students With Disabilities When the goals are set out, and the professional sphere is chosen, the counselor becomes responsible for the student’s preparation and reception of essential job skills as well as for the communication with the post-school […]
• Adaptive Behavior Skills and Intellectual Disabilities Four assessment tools are important for identifying adaptive behavior and skills: the Adaptive Behavior Scale, the Scale of Independent Behavior, and the Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scale.
• The Specific Needs of Students With Physical Disabilities The research problem that will be the focus of the planned paper relates to the specific needs of students with physical disabilities or behavioral issues in general classrooms.
• Assistive Technology for Students with Disabilities The United Nations Convention on the Rights of people with disabilities proposes a raft of measures to be undertaken by states to promote the wellbeing of individuals with disabilities.
• Job for Individuals With Physical Disabilities For instance, when a new technology is about to be installed, it will be rational for a number of workers based on departments to be selected and taken through how to use the innovation, such […]
• Language Learning Disability: Language Assessment Plan The C&FD subtest will help to evaluate Oscar’s ability to interpret, recall and execute oral commands that contain concepts of functional language.
• An Audit of the Accessibility of the College of the North Atlantic-Qatar to Individuals With Physical Disabilities It should be noted that structural presentation of the paper is considered to be one of the most important elements of the paper because it allows following the logical thought of the research paper.
• Learning Disabilities and Communication Disorders The students are also being taken through research-based and special education programs and the determination of these disorders is done cooperatively between teachers and specialists like psychologists.
• Children With Disabilities: Supporting Student Behavior The comfortable atmosphere will help the children to attend the class and also provide a good way to mingle with the children with disabilities.
• Dyslexia Disorder: Characteristics and Services Primary dyslexia is a kind of dyslexia disorder which is caused by dysfunction of cerebral cortex of the brain and the condition is not normally affected by change in growth development.
• Plan of the Kickball Game That Involves the Students With the Disabilities While simulating the situation where one is in charge of the PE class, one needs to remember that disability is never inability, thus the students with the disabilities can participate in any games as well […]
• Disability Discrimination Laws: Workers’ Compensation It is seen that The Americans with Disability Act 1990 was not having a sound definition for what constituted disability and thus the protection that could be claimed or rejected against disability is also a […]
• Genetic Testing Under Americans With Disabilities Act There is nothing surprising in the fact that the genetically tested employees counted the testing as a violation of their human rights, and The Americans with Disabilities Act was adopted in 1990.
• Disability Insurance Plans in Canada Disability insurance is the type of insurance that provides you with financial security when you are unable to work and earn an income due to an accident or illness.
• Gerontology: The Aging and Disability Programs The practitioner is in charge of taking care of older adults, and the administrator is involved in greeting and guiding the clients.
• Teaching Language to Students With Severe Disabilities The objective of this study is to find the different approaches that can be used in teaching phonics and the whole language to students with varied severe disabilities.
• Disability as a Social Problem in the UK’s History A brief historical analysis of the European disability policy of the selected period is needed to show what determined and directly influenced the development of the current disability policy in the UK.
• Art: The Illness Narrative of Invisible Disability The aluminum foil is attached to half of the page and represents that the artificial limb is attached to half of the usual limb, such as a lower leg prosthesis.
• Teaching Adaptive Behavior Skills to Children Suffering From Intellectual Disabilities in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia This theoretical framework will contribute to the validation of the perspectives used by the teachers to construct their system of beliefs regarding the process of teaching ABS to students with ID.
• Disability Experience Shaped by Society The experience of disability is connected to social perception and the infrastructure that surrounds people with disabilities. Viewing disability as a socially constructed concept provides insight into the attitudes and perceptions of disabled people.
• Individuals With Intellectual Disabilities in the Workplace Intellectual disability puts a strain on an individual’s ability to have a social life and communicate with other human beings due to the fact that their capability of adapting is limited to a certain extent.
• Cognitive Disability Resource Sheet The inability of persons with intellectual and developmental disabilities to participate in everyday life limits the reach of health promotion programs, which leads to more health-related issues.
• Lifespan Development and Learning Disabilities in Childhood Parents in this situation would most likely select the authoritative parenting style to manage children because they are left to make their own choices under a guided framework.
• Autism Should Not Be Viewed as a Disability A good example is that the treatment of autism as a mental disorder makes it possible for pharmaceutical companies and clinics to invent new health systems or procedures that will meet the needs of the […]
• Lesly Group of Companies and Disability Issues Finally, the company needs proof of any preferential treatment or handling that the employee expects to be given in his/her future dissemination of occupation duties and, if applicable, a change in the level of salary […]
• Natural Supports for Individuals With Disabilities Natural supports can be defined as personal connections and associations that improve the quality of a person’s life; these primarily include family relationships and friendships and constitute “the first line of supports, followed by informal […]
• Children With Disabilities and Parental Mistreatment The information in the article is helpful for parents of children with disabilities and other parents since it assists them in appreciating the significance of each parent’s education in lessening the incidence of child disability.
• Government Grants for People With Disabilities The paper will be based on the conditions of disabled people and the federal or state grants that they could receive in order to facilitate changes in their health and work.
• Student With Disability in Saudi Arabia: iPad Usage Introduction and Overview In order to improve the quality and accessibility of education, it is necessary to welcome diversity amongst students and create a learning environment that will allow maximum participation of students with special […]
• Disability Models, Labels, and Language Which are some of the messages that may be conveyed to the Children that One Works with through the Tendency to Ignore Differences or Stigmatise those who are Different?
• Teaching Children With Multiple Disabilities The teacher should also assist such a child in maintaining a perceptual continuum than learners who are not handicapped. On the same note, the teacher should not give the amount of work similar to children […]
• Veterans With Disabilities: Integration and Employment In this paper, the researcher looks at the main barriers to employment and integration back to the society that the veterans face, and the manner in which the existing policies can be amended to help […]
• Students With Intellectual Disabilities and Their Independence Some of these programs in the US include the Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act, which provides grants for research, technology, and training for disabled individuals, as well as the Secondary Education Act of 2002, […]
• Intellectual Disabilities and Limitations for Human Life The recognition of the lack of such skills can contribute to future opportunities for an independent life with effective interdependence and inclusion in the life of a society.
• Young Adult Children With Intellectual Disabilities Like in the study, I would also use pilot testing of the questionnaire to ascertain its validity and reliability in measuring the intended variables. The descriptions of the concepts and terms in this study are […]
• Employees With Disabilities and Their Workplace Behavior In H3, the authors found that employees with disabilities remained loyal and committed to work and were satisfied with their job.
• Epilepsy and Learning Disability Relationship Once nurses identify the symptoms of learning disability in a patient with epilepsy, they refer them to the relevant caregivers for treatment.
• Access to Disability Services from Various Aspects The impoverished state of many clients and households is exacerbated due to a lack of access to essential disability services. More than 23% of disabled adults live in deep poverty, and the median income is […]
• Child and Youth Care Perspective on Disability The origin of ASD is still unclear for the medical society, but it is assumed that the combination of genetic and environmental factors can cause it.
• Effective Teaching of Students with Disabilities To support the information that was posted in three blog entries, the author of this submission reviewed other literature on the subject to be able to support their point of view.
• Parenting Children With Learning Disabilities A number of parents also feel worthless since they get an impression that the respective learning disabilities portrayed in their children are due to their own genetic malformations.
• Caregivers’ Perceptions of People With Intellectual Disabilities
• People With Disabilities and Their Employment Issues
• Disability Simulations and Their Limitations
• American Deaf Rights History and Disability Act
• Students With Learning Disabilities and Assessment
• Mental Disabilities: Characteristics and Causes
• Patients With Learning Disabilities: Quality Care
• Age Bias, Disability, Gay Rights in the Workplace
• Sibling Relationships of Children With Disability
• Grandparents Raising Grandchildren With Disabilities
• Employment Equity Act: Aboriginals and Disabilities Persons
• People With Disabilities: Local and a Federal Law’ Regulation
• Reading Disability Controversies
• Students With Learning Disabilities: Needs and Problems
• Disability and Diversity in the Workplace
• Students With Disabilities: Characteristics and Strategies
• Instructional Plan in Writing for Learners With Disabilities
• Inclusive Education and the Cultural Representation of Disability
• People with Disabilities: The Systemic Ableism
• Learning Disability: What Is Dyslexia?
• Disability Issues in Society
• Developmental Disabilities and Lifelong Learning
• Action Plan for Patrons With Disabilities
• Remediation in Students with Disabilities
• Sexuality with the Disability
• Improving Reading Performance of Students With Learning Disabilities
• Understanding How the Medical and Social Model of Disability Supports People With Disability
• Americans With Disabilities Act
• GM’s Committal to People With Disabilities
• Supporting Students with Speech Impairment
• Physical Disabilities and Assistive Technology
• Special Interest Disability and Personal Interview
• Sensory Disabilities and Age of Onset
• High Incidence Disabilities and Pedagogical Strategies for Learning Disabilities
• Exploring Representations of Difference and Disability. Building Blocks or Barriers?
• What Is the Impact of Disability on Children’s Experiences at School?
• Families With Members Who Experience Disabilities
• Recreational Activities for People with Disabilities
• Support Inclusion and Effective Practices for Students With Disabilities
• Peer Buddy Program: Students with Disabilities in High School
• An Action Plan for Serving Individuals With Disabilities – Library and Information Science
• Proper Identification of Students With a Learning Disability
• Internal Campaign Planning for Inclusion of Persons With Disabilities
• Human Rights of People With Intellectual Disabilities
• The Individuals with Disability Education Act
• Adolescents with Learning and Behaviour Disabilities: Graduation and Employment Difficulties
• Hiring People with Disability
• The Problem of Reading of Children With Learning Disabilities
• People With Disabilities
• Impact of Individuals With Disability Education Act (IDEA) on Education
• Education Reflection on Multicultural Perspective and Disability Classes
• People With Disabilities and Abuse of People With Disabilities and Criminal Justice
• Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA)
• Terminology and Etiquette Discussion Regarding Persons With Disabilities
• People With Disabilities and the Hotel Industry
• The American Disability Act, ADA
• Post Education for Adults With Disabilities
• The Right Attitude Towards Disabled People
• Being Obese as a Disabling Disability: Concerning the Obstacles for Challenged People
• Inclusion for Students With Severe Disabilities
• The Impact of a Fitness Intervention on People with Developmental and Intellectual Disabilities
• Autism and Educational Process
• School Disability Program
• Is It Ethical to Abort Based On Genetic Disability?
• General Curriculum for Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities Learners
• US Should Ratify the UN Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities
• Disability Management Practices in Canada
• Students With Disabilities in Higher Education Institutions
• Myths and Misperceptions of the Disability
• The Individuals With Disabilities Education Improvement Act
• Peer Buddy Programs for Students With Disabilities
• Preschool Teachers’ Actions for Integrating Children With Disabilities
• What Is a Disability?
• How Has Disability Changed Over Time?
• What Special Treatment Should Students With Learning Disabilities Get?
• Can Civilian Disability Pensions Overcome the Poverty Issue?
• How Does Disability Insurance Differ From Health Insurance?
• What Can We Learn From People With Disabilities?
• Does Disability Insurance Receipt Discourage Work?
• How Can States Help Workers Keep Their Jobs After Injury, Illness, or Disability?
• Does Disability Status Modify the Association Between Psychosocial Job Quality and Mental Health?
• How Many Disability Beneficiaries Forgo Cash Benefits Because of Work?
• Does Parental Disability Matter to Child Education?
• How Does Disability Insurance Reform Change the Consequences of Health Shocks on Income and Employment?
• What Drives Inflows Into Disability?
• How Does the Composition of Disability Insurance Applicants Change Across Business Cycles?
• Does Protecting Older Workers From Discrimination Make It Harder to Get Hired?
• How Large Are the Classification Errors in the Social Security Disability Award Process?
• What Happens When the Definition of Disability Changes?
• How Does Social Constructionism Impact Our View of Disability?
• Does the Pension System’s Income Statement Matter?
• How Do Financial Incentives Induce Disability Insurance Recipients to Return to Work?
• Does Community-Based Rehabilitation Enhance the Multidimensional Well-Being of Deprived Persons With Disabilities?
• Why Are the Disability Rolls Skyrocketing?
• How Can Disability Effect Child Development?
• Are School Feeding Programs Prepared to Be Inclusive of Children With Disabilities?
• Should Children With Disabilities Be Mainstreamed or Not?
• What Makes Special-Education Teachers Special?
• Why Does Our Society Provide Vocational Rehabilitation Services for Persons With Disabilities?
• What Is the Importance of Disability Awareness?
• How Do Disabilities Affect People’s Lives?
• What Are the Five Barriers for Persons With Disabilities?
• Dementia Research Ideas
• Down Syndrome Topics
• Eugenics Questions
• Nursing Home Questions
• Orthopedics Essay Topics
• Intensive Care Research Topics
• Chronic Pain Research Ideas
• Diabetes Questions
• Chicago (A-D)
• Chicago (N-B)

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Essay on Respect For Persons With Disability

Students are often asked to write an essay on Respect For Persons With Disability in their schools and colleges. And if you’re also looking for the same, we have created 100-word, 250-word, and 500-word essays on the topic.

Let’s take a look…

100 Words Essay on Respect For Persons With Disability

Understanding disabilities.

Disability is a term used when a person’s physical or mental abilities are not like most people. This does not mean they are less important. People with disabilities can do many things just like anyone else. They might just do them differently.

Respecting Differences

Respect means treating people with kindness and understanding. It’s important to respect people with disabilities. They have the same feelings and rights as everyone else. They deserve to be treated fairly and equally.

Showing Respect

There are many ways to show respect to people with disabilities. One way is by being patient. Another way is by learning about their disability. This can help you understand their needs better.

Importance of Inclusion

Inclusion means including everyone in activities. It’s important to include people with disabilities in all things. This shows respect and helps them feel accepted. It also helps others learn about different abilities.

Ending Discrimination

250 words essay on respect for persons with disability.

Disability is a condition that can make some activities harder for a person. People with disabilities might need to use a wheelchair or need extra help with learning. But they are just like everyone else and deserve the same respect.

Respect means treating others the way you want to be treated. It’s about accepting people as they are. When we meet someone with a disability, we should not feel sorry for them. Instead, we should respect their abilities and strengths.

Being Kind and Helpful

Kindness is a simple way to show respect. If a person with a disability needs help, we can offer it. But remember, we should always ask first. They may want to do things on their own.

Using Polite Words

We should always use polite words when talking about disabilities. For example, we say ‘people with disabilities’ and not ‘disabled people’. This way, we focus on the person, not the disability.

Learning Together

We can learn a lot from people with disabilities. They often have to find new ways to do things. This can teach us about problem-solving and creativity.

500 Words Essay on Respect For Persons With Disability

Understanding respect.

Respect means to show regard or consideration towards someone or something. It’s a way of treating or thinking about something or someone. If you respect someone, you accept that they are different and valuable in their own way.

Understanding Disability

Disability is a term that we use when a person has certain limits in doing things that most of us can do easily. These limits could be in hearing, seeing, moving, learning, or even in social situations. It’s important to remember that disability is just a different way of living and not a disease.

Respect for Persons with Disability

Why it’s important.

Respect for persons with disability is important for many reasons. Firstly, it helps them feel valued and included. When they are treated with respect, they feel good about themselves and their abilities. They are more likely to be confident and happy.

Secondly, it helps us grow as individuals and as a society. When we show respect to persons with disability, we learn to appreciate diversity and understand that everyone has a role to play in the world. It makes us more compassionate and understanding.

How to Show Respect

Another way is by being patient and understanding. If they take longer to do something, or if they do it differently, we should not make fun or get annoyed. We should understand that they are doing their best.

We can also show respect by including them in our activities. We should invite them to join in games, discussions, and other social activities. This shows that we value their participation and enjoy their company.

Respect for persons with disability is not just about being nice. It’s about understanding and accepting their unique experiences and contributions. It’s about treating them as equals and making sure they feel included and valued. By showing respect, we can help build a more understanding and compassionate society.

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Home — Essay Samples — Nursing & Health — Disability — “Disability Can Be a Physical Limitation But Nothing Can Limit a Person’s Skill”

"Disability Can Be a Physical Limitation But Nothing Can Limit a Person’s Skill"

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Published: Nov 26, 2019

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Disability in India Is Still All About the Able

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Disability in India remains about the able-bodied. Why?

Participants walk in a rally demanding rights for persons with disability in Kolkata, India, on International Day of Persons with Disabilities on December 3, 2016.

Last week week, the first Global Disability Summit was held in London with the intent to amplify the voices of people with disabilities around the world. Its chant of “nothing about us, without us” echoes in India, too. Over the last few years, the disability rights movement has been instrumental in effecting inclusive laws, which have proven to be hard-fought victories. Yet the rights-based approach has to meet the needs of another cause – that of dismantling existing notions on disability in both policy and public discourse.

As per the country’s latest statistics , an estimated 2.1 percent of the Indian population has a disability; a humbling figure of over 26 million people. A person can face disability — intellectually and physically — at any point in their life from medical complications or life-altering events. Experts agree that a singular, universally accepted definition of disability does not exist. Even as a set of symptoms can be clustered medically, it is highly likely that each person’s need would differ from that of another with the same medical condition. Definitions on what constitutes disability, crafted by agencies responsible for securing the rights of persons with disability, such as the government, are thus only frameworks for efficient policy implementation and fulfillment of legal mandates. An understanding of this nuance has largely been missing in active implementation of policy till now.

Nowhere is a conflict more evident than in the case of rare conditions or medical conditions that very few individuals in a population have.

In 2016, after years of painstaking advocacy by disability rights activists with the government, the Indian Parliament expanded the number of disabilities covered under the law from seven to 21. Crucially, rare conditions such as cerebral palsy, autism, and muscular dystrophy, among others were included. Rare conditions can be chronic in nature and require strong interventions. For instance: specialist medical attention is required throughout a patient’s life, along with access to affordable medication and assistive technologies to improve the quality of living.  Matters are made worse by an emasculated public healthcare system, which is witnessing an 82 percent vacancy rate in sanctioned posts for specialists at rural Community Health Centers; a majority of people with disabilities (69 percent) reside in rural areas. Patients are usually referred to specialists in tertiary hospitals, located in major cities.

The move by Parliament was an incredibly empowering step for a country that remains largely uninformed about disability-related matters. While some disabilities are widely recognized by the public, others are not. What exactly makes a person in India “disabled”?

The existence of a medical condition is not enough. The probable answer is that an unsavory combination of factors conflates medical conditions with undesirable social tendencies and lack of adequate safeguards. These include negative attitudes toward the outlier individual in communities and in employment, misinformed personal notions in interactions with a person with disability, and the absence of inclusive opportunities and physical spaces. The figures speak for themselves. Only 14.6 million people with disabilities in India are literate. Of those, just a little over 1 million are graduates, and the situation for women is worse than for men. Even now, two-thirds of India’s states have yet to notify rules on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (RPWD) Act passed in 2016, which includes affirmative action by raising reservation quotas in higher education and in government jobs.

Thus, social and public systems are not serving the needs of people with disabilities.

It is against this context that the disability rights movement has been trying to secure a life of dignity for people with all kind of disabilities. However, the current way we perceive ability has engendered unsustainable notions of disability. The binary the rights movement is facing is evident – disability is perceived as being inconvenient to the patient and their family, while ability is commonly construed to be the opposite and thus desirable. The division of disabled/differently-abled/persons with disabilities and the able-bodied has proven dangerous because we have overlooked the individualistic nature of medical disorders and the set of circumstances that are unique to the people who are challenged by them.

The Indian government has sought to change the terminology in the disability debate from viklangjan (disabled people) to that of divyangjan (loosely translates to divine-gifted). Irrespective of good intentions, the divyangjan term now officially used by the government is still problematic. This issue has been raised and commented on by many within the disability rights movement . Critically, in its approach to change the way people perceive disability, the divyangjan narrative does little to destigmatize disabilities or make people aware of or responsive to the realities of people with disabilities. An opportunity has been lost.

Consider the reality. Care and management of rare conditions in developing countries such as India is an immensely hard task. Trained medical supervision for diagnosis and monitoring is hard to come by, even privately. The chances of misdiagnosis are high, rare conditions often have no cure, and new drug development can take decades. Supportive treatment to enhance quality of life, when and where available, is expensive. The facts are a strike on the face at a time when 33 percent of people with disabilities (not just rare) are in the 10-29 year age group, just starting out their lives. Many with disabilities are locked away in homes, yet others struggle to survive .

What is at stake is their well-being, at present and in the future. Until now, the state of affairs has necessitated that different disabilities compete for recognition and validation, for instance, as reflected in the process that led to the expansion of the types of disabilities under law. It is no secret that the majority of decision-makers in private and public spheres are able-bodied. So the goal of “nothing about us, without us” is far from the case.  

The disability rights movement is trying to address the issue by advancing the agenda of inclusiveness. The question should now transition from acceptance into the society (inclusiveness) to equal partnerships with the able-bodied. Until more people who have disabilities enter government, public spaces, schools, and offices, an understanding of their differences and needs will be as vague as it is now in the public sphere. To be able to realize the goal of inclusiveness, a radical shift in perspective — that of being equal partners in development and decision-making — is needed first. 

This shift is difficult to achieve, but not impossible.

While the disability rights movement in India has had a rich history, discussions on rare conditions have only recently gained traction, as has a nuanced understanding of disability in policy and in public. Rare conditions, for one, point to the urgent need to take another look at the lens of disability in the country. The movement is fighting a hard battle, but it is not theirs alone to lead. More importantly, we must ask if we are truly trying to make lives better for persons with disabilities — or is this rather a bargain of empowerment made by the able.

Avantika Shrivastava is a Delhi-based strategic communications professional and former journalist.

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The four Competencies and associated learning objectives will address the knowledge gaps for public health professionals about disability, and health disparities. They provide foundational knowledge about the relationship between public health programs and health outcomes among people with disabilities. The Competencies can also be embedded into existing public health curriculum and training programs.

Implementation of these Competencies, and strategies, will build a stronger public health workforce skilled in ways to include people with disabilities in public health planning efforts and reduce health disparities for this population.

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27 Eye-Opening Quotes From People With Disabilities

"Stop saying I am inspiring or amazing when I do ordinary things."

One in four adults in the U.S. has a disability, including 10% percent of people who live with an "invisible" disability . And yet, the Americans with Disabilities Act , a long overdue law that protects people with disabilities in many areas of public life, was passed only three decades ago. Today, many still deal with rampant ableism , a set of beliefs or practices that devalue or discriminate against people with physical, intellectual or psychiatric disabilities.

We spoke to a variety of people from all over the country who have both visible and invisible disabilities about what they wish people outside the community knew, misconceptions that they encounter and things they wish people would stop doing or saying.

What do you wish people outside the disability community knew or understood?

• “ That having a disability can be a positive part of who you are . My disability has shaped my career and has allowed me to meet so many wonderful people! ” — Arielle Silverman, 39, is blind. She is d irector of research at the American Foundation for the Blind.
• “ Deafness does not prevent people from being successful — discrimination is the main barrier we face.” —Sheryl Emery, 64, is deaf. She is President of National Black Deaf Advocates .
• “ Ableist ideas and beliefs affect people with disabilities in all aspects of life , including employment, healthcare, education, housing, transportation, etc. These ideas and beliefs create systems that discriminate and oppress people with disabilities.” —Theo W. Braddy is paralyzed from the neck down. He is executive director of The National Council on Independent Living .
• “Autism can be an incredibly debilitating disability— there’s an extremely high prevalence of loneliness in the autism community. Individuals with autism die 16 years younger than the average human. 85% of college educated autistics are unemployed. I like to say that with autism I can excel at the extraordinary, but I can really struggle with the simple .”— Russell Lehmann , 33, has autism, OCD, depression and anxiety. He is a speaker, poet and activist.
• “ People with disabilities are just as worthy as those without disabilities to live happy, productive lives.” — Sydney Badeau, 30, has dyspraxia, a nonverbal learning disorder and a sensory processing disorder. She is an advocacy and outreach specialist at The Arc Wisconsin .
• “ Recognizing the importance of accessibility and inclusivity is vital . For example, having ramps and wider doorways not only benefits wheelchair users but also individuals with mild cerebral palsy, who may experience difficulty with coordination or movement on one side of their body. This promotes equality and empathy for everyone. —Ashley Glears, 30, has cerebral palsy with right hemiplegia. She is a chapter associate at The Arc of the United States.
• “It’s important to understand that disability is a natural part of the human experience and that people with disabilities deserve equal rights, opportunities, and respect. I wish people outside the disability community understood the significance of inclusive practices and the value of diverse perspectives in all aspects of life. ” —Dr. Yvette Pegues, Ed.D., 45, has a traumatic brain injury and spinal cord injuries. She is D&I Executive & Chief Diversity Officer at Your Invisible Disability Group.
• “ People with disabilities are individually different from each other . We have different goals and views. We have different approaches to life. We are just human beings who want equal access to reach our different goals.” — Sean Pevsner, 53, has cerebral palsy. He is a law firm partner with Whitburn & Pevsner, PLLC .

What do you wish people outside the disability community would stop doing and/or saying?

• “ I wish they would stop saying I am amazing or inspiring when I do ordinary things. ” — Arielle Silverman
• “ Stop asking Deaf people if we can read your lips. Communication is the responsibility of all parties in a conversation . Asking the Deaf person to read your lips places all the responsibility for communicating on the Deaf person. ” —Sheryl Emery
• “ Stop saying people with disabilities are a vulnerable population. People with disabilities are not weak and fragile - this characterization does more harm than good. ” — Theo W. Braddy
• “I wish people would refrain from making assumptions or judgments about individuals with disabilities based solely on their appearance or perceived limitations. It's important to approach each person with respect, understanding, and open-mindedness.” — Ashley Glears
• “I wish people would stop constantly infantilizing adults with disabilities , especially those who are nonspeaking or minimally speaking.” —Elizabeth "Lizzy" Graham, 34, has Asperger’s/Autism, ADHD, Anxiety with OCD tendencies, eczema and obstructive sleep apnea. She is service coordinator for Medicaid HCBS Waiver Services at The Arc of Prince George's County.
• "I wish people would stop using derogatory terms about people with disabilities and assuming that having a disability means you can't do something. For example, I enjoy 20+ adapted sports and my activity is a form of activism." — Dr. Yvette Pegues
• “People should stop automatically assuming that we are brave for dealing with our disabilities. People should stop considering us vulnerable people who cannot work and contribute to our community.” — Sean Pevsner
• “I wish they would stop making fun of and looking down on people with disabilities. I also wish they would stop treating people with disabilities like children . Often time, people with intellectual and developmental disabilities are treated like children. They’re not - they’re adults.” — Melody Cooper, 54, has cerebral palsy and intellectual disability. She is self-advocate specialist at The Arc of Indiana .
• “One thing that I wish people would stop assuming is that people who experience disability are living off the government . This is not the case at all. We need the assistance to live a normal life like everyone else in the world and we are trying to make something for ourselves with the support we have provided to us.” — Ric Nelson, 40, has cerebral palsy. He is an executive director of Peer Power .

What's a misconception people have about you and your abilities?

• “ That I am lacking something or 'living in darkness .' Or that I am perpetually afraid of the world around me just because I can’t see it. My life experience is rich with many other sensations, thoughts and emotions that have nothing to do with vision or lack thereof. ” — Arielle Silverman
• “ There are Deaf people in almost every profession. Don’t assume because a person cannot hear that they are incapable. Not everyone lip reads and we do not have better sight to make up for not being able to hear . We enjoy music, we drive. The biggest barriers we face are attitudes.” —Sheryl Emery
• “ The biggest misconception is they're underestimating me and the 61 million others like me - this comes from a long history of devaluing people like me.” —Theo W. Braddy
• “ Society has taught me from a young age that I can’t show my autism in public . So, a lot of my struggles are in my house, alone. A lot of the struggle is behind the scenes.” — Russell Lehmann
• “One big misconception is that I am not able to follow directions, learn, or be employable . I want to work, so I can be independent and get my own apartment.” —Marcus Stewart, 23, has Down Syndrome.
• “That not everyone with a disability presents in the same way. Some may struggle with something while others may not, and each person may need different or unique accommodations.” — Sydney Badeau

• “One common misconception people have about me and my abilities is assuming that I'm only capable of simple tasks or responses, when in reality, I'm capable of understanding complex concepts and engaging in meaningful conversations across a wide range of topics.” — Ashley Glears
• “I operate at the intersections of a woman of color with visible and non-visible disabilities, so I encounter many layers of misconceptions in my life. Nevertheless, I’m a proud wife, mom, engineer, educator, and advocate. My daily fight for the cessation of stereotypes and stigmatizing language surrounding disability is not for me, but others without the voice to fight for themselves. I wish people understood the innovative contributions that disabled people bring to communities and society .” —Dr. Yvette Pegues
• “ People have the misconception that I cannot represent people in cases . They assume incorrectly that since I have a speech impairment, I cannot argue for my clients’ best interest. It is very tiring to have to constantly prove myself.” — Sean Pevsner
• “People have thought that I would never be anything or do anything, that I don’t know what’s going on in the world. Having an intellectual disability does not mean you’re dumb . They work harder than most just to do things others take for granted. They may need help with certain things, but don’t we all?” — Melody Cooper

Beth (she/her) is the executive editor of Good Housekeeping , where she oversees all print content and manages features, personal essays and special projects for the brand. She is a former executive editor at Woman’s Day and features director at Reader’s Digest and a current adjunct professor at New York University in the School of Professional Studies. As a former college and semi-professional soccer player, she twice had the unfortunate experience of playing against Abby Wambach.

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Believe that disability is just a state of mind!

It was a moment of national pride when the Physically Disabled Indian Cricket team won the Singapore tour this year. The team showed great strength, determination, and commitment. Yet on the other hand the society holds stereotypes against disabilities and they continue to be disrespected as if don not exist.

According to the 2011 census, more than 26,810,557 men and women are disabled. In both urban and rural India the male ratio is much above than female. Rural India Data indicates that the male ratio of disabled is around more than ten crores, the female ratio is more than eight crores. In urban India male disabled population is approximately 4 crores, and female is more than three crores.

63.66 per cent of the disabled population is unemployed compared to 60.21 per cent employment in rural and urban areas. The census mentioned eight categories qualified to be called disability – seeing, hearing, speech, movement, mental retardation, mental illness, multiple illnesses, and multiple disabilities. At the same time some NGOs, activists and celebrities are doing their best for the cause with the help of the government. It always has been a challenging situation for bringing a person with disabilities into the mainstream due to socio-economic differences.

A person suffering from any physical challenges needs social inclusion, empowerment, financial independence and awareness of his or her rights. Skill development training is offered by the government and NGOs for digital training, mobile repairing, sewing, and so on. Narayan Seva Sansthan also provides basic tool kits of hardware & networking, mobile and appliances repairing; and sewing machine in free after successful completion of programs

Since 2011, Narayan Seva Sansthan has provided skills to 8,750 differently disabled in different segments as mobile repairing 2,875 and sewing 3,045 and computer hardware 2,830. After the training, the NGO offers free certificate and tools to establish their own startup business. Along with this, NSS has operated on over 3.5 lakh patients in the last 30 years. Narayan Seva Sansthan gives aids and appliances, distributes food & clothes, provides free treatment, and free house distribution. Skill development training is focused on an individual’s disability, educational qualification and job requirement. Narayan Seva Sansthan’s founder believes, making patients physically fit is not enough, to make them more confident and self-reliant we must change their perspective towards life by bringing them into the main stream.

Asha Ka Jharna has been supporting children with disabilities in rural area of Rajasthan. Since its inception in Nawalgarh, more than 500 children have flourished through the special school, and about 250 beneficiaries have graduated from school board levels equivalent to class 8th from the National Institute of Open Schooling (NIOS).

Sarthak Educational Trust is supporting disabled and providing them the skills. They have trained more than 11,000 candidates and employed around 14,000. This NGO offers three months training program in 3 broad segments IT,-ITES, Tourism & Hospitality and Organized Retail.

As per news reports, The Union Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment is planning to make Delhi 'a disabled-friendly city.' This move will definitely change the life of the disabled and the way society looks at them, will uplift and improve their standard of living as they will be able to access most of the public and private places in their city.

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Sample Essay on: Disability is a State of Mind

Essay / research paper abstract.

A 4 page essay that discusses accommodations that can be made for disabled individuals. This paper looks at various ways in which the needs of the disabled are being accommodated and how this impacts their lives from a philosophical perspective. Bibliography lists 3 sources.

Page Count:

4 pages (~225 words per page)

File: D0_khdistex.rtf

Unformatted sample text from the term paper:

or another (Hanson 29). This classification of people includes those whom society labels as disabled, due to various conceived handicaps. However, examination of this perception of difference suggests it is the circumstances, rather than the person, that indicate the appropriateness of such a label. For example, a blind person is no more disabled than a sighted individual, and probably has an advantage, within the framework of a power failure on a dark night (Hanson 29). In other words, given the right environment, with the right accommodations, disability and its accompanying ramifications, tends to disappear. Therefore, the following investigation looks at various ways in which the needs of the disabled are being accommodated and how this impacts their lives. Since the advent of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), more is being done to accommodate the needs of disabled persons and this includes the computer industry. There are one-handed keyboards, large-button keyboards (for people with hand tremors) and software programs that can convert text into speech (Reilly 58). However, once they have gained Internet access, disabled surfers of the Web are presented with obstacles are many sites are not equipped to receive or understand the information presented by these computer users (Reilly 58). For example, for the hearing-impaired, audio files should be accompanied by a synchronized text transcript (closed captioning) and audio announcements should also have a synchronized text presentation. When AOL makes its famous announcement "Youve got mail," there should be a way for the hearing-impaired user to see a similar announcement (Reilly 58). Similarly, it is recommended that accommodations should be made for vision-impaired users. Web sites should provide information text equivalents of graphics that clearly identify changes from the natural language of a documents text to captions or advertisements, as well as provide text summaries of ...

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Department of Education

From insight to impact with professor christopher cleveland.

Our new "Insight to Impact" series invites faculty from the Education Department to share how their recent research can be applied in practical ways that improve education systems. Here, we look at Professor Cleveland's research papers, "Understanding Individualized Education Program (IEP) Goals at Scale" and "The Effects of Response to Intervention on Disability Identification and Achievement."

The Research

Understanding Individualized Education Program (IEP) Goals at Scale

07/2024 | Annenberg Institute EdWorkingPapers | Christopher Cleveland , Jessica Markham. 

Students with disabilities represent 15% of U.S. public school students. Individualized Education Programs (IEPs) inform how students with disabilities experience education. Very little is known about the aspects of IEPs as they are historically paper-based forms. In this study, we develop a coding taxonomy to categorize IEP goals into 10 subjects and 40 skills. We apply the taxonomy to digital IEP records for an entire state to understand the variety of IEP goal subjects and skills prescribed to students with different disabilities. This study highlights the utility of studying digital IEP records for informing practice and policy. 

From Insight to Impact

Traditional information captured in state and district administrative data about the experiences of students with disabilities is insufficient to understand the nuances of experiences as further reflected in student IEPs.

States and districts can systematize the collection of IEPs through digital systems or well-managed online PDF systems to integrate with research tools that allow for the synthesis of patterns across IEPs.

The patterns of information identified in different parts of the IEP can be used to inform professional development, support efforts, and compliance.  

The Effects of Response to Intervention on Disability Identification and Achievement

08/2024 | Annenberg Institute EdWorkingPapers | Nicholas Ainsworth, Christopher Cleveland , Andrew Penner.

Currently 15 percent of U.S. students receive special education services, a widespread intensive intervention with variable effects on students. Spurred by changes in federal policy, many states and districts have begun adopting the Response to Intervention (RTI) approach to identifying students to receive special education services. RTI seeks to provide a system for targeting interventions to children facing early academic challenges and identifying children with specific learning disabilities (SLD). This paper uses a difference-in-differences design to examine the effects of RTI adoption across Oregon on elementary students’ disability identification and state-standardized achievement test scores. RTI adoption reduced special education identification by 1.4 percentage points (11%) and SLD identification by 0.5 percentage points (15%). RTI also caused moderately large reading test score gains for Black students (0.15 SD) and did not reduce other students’ achievement. These findings suggest RTI is a promising approach to supporting struggling students.

Systematic approaches, such as RTI, can support students’  literacy development and special education identification if implemented with efficacy.

States and districts should collect implementation data on RTI to allow for the evaluation of these efforts

States and districts should be mindful of the resource reallocation and professional development issues that are part of shifting to a new method of educating and identifying students with a disability. 

Samantha Putterman, PolitiFact Samantha Putterman, PolitiFact

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• Copy URL https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/fact-checking-warnings-from-democrats-about-project-2025-and-donald-trump

Fact-checking warnings from Democrats about Project 2025 and Donald Trump

This fact check originally appeared on PolitiFact .

Project 2025 has a starring role in this week’s Democratic National Convention.

And it was front and center on Night 1.

WATCH: Hauling large copy of Project 2025, Michigan state Sen. McMorrow speaks at 2024 DNC

“This is Project 2025,” Michigan state Sen. Mallory McMorrow, D-Royal Oak, said as she laid a hardbound copy of the 900-page document on the lectern. “Over the next four nights, you are going to hear a lot about what is in this 900-page document. Why? Because this is the Republican blueprint for a second Trump term.”

Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, has warned Americans about “Trump’s Project 2025” agenda — even though former President Donald Trump doesn’t claim the conservative presidential transition document.

“Donald Trump wants to take our country backward,” Harris said July 23 in Milwaukee. “He and his extreme Project 2025 agenda will weaken the middle class. Like, we know we got to take this seriously, and can you believe they put that thing in writing?”

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, Harris’ running mate, has joined in on the talking point.

“Don’t believe (Trump) when he’s playing dumb about this Project 2025. He knows exactly what it’ll do,” Walz said Aug. 9 in Glendale, Arizona.

Trump’s campaign has worked to build distance from the project, which the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, led with contributions from dozens of conservative groups.

Much of the plan calls for extensive executive-branch overhauls and draws on both long-standing conservative principles, such as tax cuts, and more recent culture war issues. It lays out recommendations for disbanding the Commerce and Education departments, eliminating certain climate protections and consolidating more power to the president.

Project 2025 offers a sweeping vision for a Republican-led executive branch, and some of its policies mirror Trump’s 2024 agenda, But Harris and her presidential campaign have at times gone too far in describing what the project calls for and how closely the plans overlap with Trump’s campaign.

PolitiFact researched Harris’ warnings about how the plan would affect reproductive rights, federal entitlement programs and education, just as we did for President Joe Biden’s Project 2025 rhetoric. Here’s what the project does and doesn’t call for, and how it squares with Trump’s positions.

Are Trump and Project 2025 connected?

To distance himself from Project 2025 amid the Democratic attacks, Trump wrote on Truth Social that he “knows nothing” about it and has “no idea” who is in charge of it. (CNN identified at least 140 former advisers from the Trump administration who have been involved.)

The Heritage Foundation sought contributions from more than 100 conservative organizations for its policy vision for the next Republican presidency, which was published in 2023.

Project 2025 is now winding down some of its policy operations, and director Paul Dans, a former Trump administration official, is stepping down, The Washington Post reported July 30. Trump campaign managers Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita denounced the document.

WATCH: A look at the Project 2025 plan to reshape government and Trump’s links to its authors

However, Project 2025 contributors include a number of high-ranking officials from Trump’s first administration, including former White House adviser Peter Navarro and former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson.

A recently released recording of Russell Vought, a Project 2025 author and the former director of Trump’s Office of Management and Budget, showed Vought saying Trump’s “very supportive of what we do.” He said Trump was only distancing himself because Democrats were making a bogeyman out of the document.

Project 2025 wouldn’t ban abortion outright, but would curtail access

The Harris campaign shared a graphic on X that claimed “Trump’s Project 2025 plan for workers” would “go after birth control and ban abortion nationwide.”

The plan doesn’t call to ban abortion nationwide, though its recommendations could curtail some contraceptives and limit abortion access.

What’s known about Trump’s abortion agenda neither lines up with Harris’ description nor Project 2025’s wish list.

Project 2025 says the Department of Health and Human Services Department should “return to being known as the Department of Life by explicitly rejecting the notion that abortion is health care.”

It recommends that the Food and Drug Administration reverse its 2000 approval of mifepristone, the first pill taken in a two-drug regimen for a medication abortion. Medication is the most common form of abortion in the U.S. — accounting for around 63 percent in 2023.

If mifepristone were to remain approved, Project 2025 recommends new rules, such as cutting its use from 10 weeks into pregnancy to seven. It would have to be provided to patients in person — part of the group’s efforts to limit access to the drug by mail. In June, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected a legal challenge to mifepristone’s FDA approval over procedural grounds.

WATCH: Trump’s plans for health care and reproductive rights if he returns to White House The manual also calls for the Justice Department to enforce the 1873 Comstock Act on mifepristone, which bans the mailing of “obscene” materials. Abortion access supporters fear that a strict interpretation of the law could go further to ban mailing the materials used in procedural abortions, such as surgical instruments and equipment.

The plan proposes withholding federal money from states that don’t report to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention how many abortions take place within their borders. The plan also would prohibit abortion providers, such as Planned Parenthood, from receiving Medicaid funds. It also calls for the Department of Health and Human Services to ensure that the training of medical professionals, including doctors and nurses, omits abortion training.

The document says some forms of emergency contraception — particularly Ella, a pill that can be taken within five days of unprotected sex to prevent pregnancy — should be excluded from no-cost coverage. The Affordable Care Act requires most private health insurers to cover recommended preventive services, which involves a range of birth control methods, including emergency contraception.

Trump has recently said states should decide abortion regulations and that he wouldn’t block access to contraceptives. Trump said during his June 27 debate with Biden that he wouldn’t ban mifepristone after the Supreme Court “approved” it. But the court rejected the lawsuit based on standing, not the case’s merits. He has not weighed in on the Comstock Act or said whether he supports it being used to block abortion medication, or other kinds of abortions.

Project 2025 doesn’t call for cutting Social Security, but proposes some changes to Medicare

“When you read (Project 2025),” Harris told a crowd July 23 in Wisconsin, “you will see, Donald Trump intends to cut Social Security and Medicare.”

The Project 2025 document does not call for Social Security cuts. None of its 10 references to Social Security addresses plans for cutting the program.

Harris also misleads about Trump’s Social Security views.

In his earlier campaigns and before he was a politician, Trump said about a half-dozen times that he’s open to major overhauls of Social Security, including cuts and privatization. More recently, in a March 2024 CNBC interview, Trump said of entitlement programs such as Social Security, “There’s a lot you can do in terms of entitlements, in terms of cutting.” However, he quickly walked that statement back, and his CNBC comment stands at odds with essentially everything else Trump has said during the 2024 presidential campaign.

Trump’s campaign website says that not “a single penny” should be cut from Social Security. We rated Harris’ claim that Trump intends to cut Social Security Mostly False.

Project 2025 does propose changes to Medicare, including making Medicare Advantage, the private insurance offering in Medicare, the “default” enrollment option. Unlike Original Medicare, Medicare Advantage plans have provider networks and can also require prior authorization, meaning that the plan can approve or deny certain services. Original Medicare plans don’t have prior authorization requirements.

The manual also calls for repealing health policies enacted under Biden, such as the Inflation Reduction Act. The law enabled Medicare to negotiate with drugmakers for the first time in history, and recently resulted in an agreement with drug companies to lower the prices of 10 expensive prescriptions for Medicare enrollees.

Trump, however, has said repeatedly during the 2024 presidential campaign that he will not cut Medicare.

Project 2025 would eliminate the Education Department, which Trump supports

The Harris campaign said Project 2025 would “eliminate the U.S. Department of Education” — and that’s accurate. Project 2025 says federal education policy “should be limited and, ultimately, the federal Department of Education should be eliminated.” The plan scales back the federal government’s role in education policy and devolves the functions that remain to other agencies.

Aside from eliminating the department, the project also proposes scrapping the Biden administration’s Title IX revision, which prohibits discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. It also would let states opt out of federal education programs and calls for passing a federal parents’ bill of rights similar to ones passed in some Republican-led state legislatures.

Republicans, including Trump, have pledged to close the department, which gained its status in 1979 within Democratic President Jimmy Carter’s presidential Cabinet.

In one of his Agenda 47 policy videos, Trump promised to close the department and “to send all education work and needs back to the states.” Eliminating the department would have to go through Congress.

What Project 2025, Trump would do on overtime pay

In the graphic, the Harris campaign says Project 2025 allows “employers to stop paying workers for overtime work.”

The plan doesn’t call for banning overtime wages. It recommends changes to some Occupational Safety and Health Administration, or OSHA, regulations and to overtime rules. Some changes, if enacted, could result in some people losing overtime protections, experts told us.

The document proposes that the Labor Department maintain an overtime threshold “that does not punish businesses in lower-cost regions (e.g., the southeast United States).” This threshold is the amount of money executive, administrative or professional employees need to make for an employer to exempt them from overtime pay under the Fair Labor Standards Act.

In 2019, the Trump’s administration finalized a rule that expanded overtime pay eligibility to most salaried workers earning less than about $35,568, which it said made about 1.3 million more workers eligible for overtime pay. The Trump-era threshold is high enough to cover most line workers in lower-cost regions, Project 2025 said.

The Biden administration raised that threshold to $43,888 beginning July 1, and that will rise to $58,656 on Jan. 1, 2025. That would grant overtime eligibility to about 4 million workers, the Labor Department said.

It’s unclear how many workers Project 2025’s proposal to return to the Trump-era overtime threshold in some parts of the country would affect, but experts said some would presumably lose the right to overtime wages.

Other overtime proposals in Project 2025’s plan include allowing some workers to choose to accumulate paid time off instead of overtime pay, or to work more hours in one week and fewer in the next, rather than receive overtime.

Trump’s past with overtime pay is complicated. In 2016, the Obama administration said it would raise the overtime to salaried workers earning less than $47,476 a year, about double the exemption level set in 2004 of $23,660 a year.

But when a judge blocked the Obama rule, the Trump administration didn’t challenge the court ruling. Instead it set its own overtime threshold, which raised the amount, but by less than Obama.

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https://educationhub.blog.gov.uk/2024/08/20/gcse-results-day-2024-number-grading-system/

GCSE results day 2024: Everything you need to know including the number grading system

Thousands of students across the country will soon be finding out their GCSE results and thinking about the next steps in their education.   

Here we explain everything you need to know about the big day, from when results day is, to the current 9-1 grading scale, to what your options are if your results aren’t what you’re expecting.  

When is GCSE results day 2024?  

GCSE results day will be taking place on Thursday the 22 August.     

The results will be made available to schools on Wednesday and available to pick up from your school by 8am on Thursday morning.  

Schools will issue their own instructions on how and when to collect your results.   

When did we change to a number grading scale?  

The shift to the numerical grading system was introduced in England in 2017 firstly in English language, English literature, and maths.  

By 2020 all subjects were shifted to number grades. This means anyone with GCSE results from 2017-2020 will have a combination of both letters and numbers.  

The numerical grading system was to signal more challenging GCSEs and to better differentiate between students’ abilities - particularly at higher grades between the A *-C grades. There only used to be 4 grades between A* and C, now with the numerical grading scale there are 6.  

What do the number grades mean?  

The grades are ranked from 1, the lowest, to 9, the highest.  

The grades don’t exactly translate, but the two grading scales meet at three points as illustrated below.  

The bottom of grade 7 is aligned with the bottom of grade A, while the bottom of grade 4 is aligned to the bottom of grade C.    

Meanwhile, the bottom of grade 1 is aligned to the bottom of grade G.  

What to do if your results weren’t what you were expecting?  

If your results weren’t what you were expecting, firstly don’t panic. You have options.  

First things first, speak to your school or college – they could be flexible on entry requirements if you’ve just missed your grades.   

They’ll also be able to give you the best tailored advice on whether re-sitting while studying for your next qualifications is a possibility.   

If you’re really unhappy with your results you can enter to resit all GCSE subjects in summer 2025. You can also take autumn exams in GCSE English language and maths.  

Speak to your sixth form or college to decide when it’s the best time for you to resit a GCSE exam.  

Look for other courses with different grade requirements     

Entry requirements vary depending on the college and course. Ask your school for advice, and call your college or another one in your area to see if there’s a space on a course you’re interested in.    

Consider an apprenticeship    

Apprenticeships combine a practical training job with study too. They’re open to you if you’re 16 or over, living in England, and not in full time education.  

As an apprentice you’ll be a paid employee, have the opportunity to work alongside experienced staff, gain job-specific skills, and get time set aside for training and study related to your role.   

You can find out more about how to apply here .  

Talk to a National Careers Service (NCS) adviser    

The National Career Service is a free resource that can help you with your career planning. Give them a call to discuss potential routes into higher education, further education, or the workplace.   

Whatever your results, if you want to find out more about all your education and training options, as well as get practical advice about your exam results, visit the  National Careers Service page  and Skills for Careers to explore your study and work choices.   

You may also be interested in:

• Results day 2024: What's next after picking up your A level, T level and VTQ results?
• When is results day 2024? GCSEs, A levels, T Levels and VTQs

Tags: GCSE grade equivalent , gcse number grades , GCSE results , gcse results day 2024 , gsce grades old and new , new gcse grades

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