From the Rocky Mountain News:

Disability advocates in Colorado say the economic downturn is wiping out legislative gains that had promised relief to families waiting years for services.

Ten bills were passed this year with bipartisan support to address the critical needs of some 12,000 people with developmental disabilities waiting an average of eight years for services in Colorado.

Now, funding has been cut for the new programs and initiatives. Among the ideas that are off the table: tax credits to businesses hiring people with developmentally disabilities, state contracts for nonprofits employing people with disabilities, an online list of abusive caregivers, and matching funds for parents saving money for children with disabilities.

At the same time, three regional centers that house and treat adults with severe developmental disabilities have not been able to accept new clients for months because they can’t expand staffs.

Sidebar: Springs disabled man overcomes hurdles

Earlier posts here, here, here, and here.

From AP/Washington Post:

Mental patients sprinkled throughout the nation’s psychiatric hospitals are being locked up alone for years despite laws aimed at preventing the practice, because medical workers say they’re too dangerous to handle any other way.

Health officials call them outliers — rare, unpredictably violent people who don’t respond to medication or other treatment. Advocates call them victims of a system that has lost patience and creativity in caring for those who are most difficult to treat.

The Associated Press found at least a dozen patients in various states who were held in seclusion for months or years at a time, including some who were tethered or strapped down for more than a year.

Reports of a first-trimester blood test that could accurately diagnose Down syndrome in utero have made the lists of the top science stories of the year, as compiled by ABC News and Fox News.

ABC’s story centered on the SEQure DX test, developed by the San Diego-based company Sequenom. The company is reporting accurate results when the test is administered in the twelfth or thirteenth week of pregnancy, and its stock has risen dramatically since the first test results were reported last spring. Television personality Jim Cramer recently recommended shares of the company’s stock, calling it a potential takeover target.

The Fox News story focused on a test developed by researchers in Hong Kong.

If proven successful, either test could revolutionize prenatal diagnostics for Down syndrome, allowing pregnant women to determine accurately whether their fetus has Down syndrome with substantially less risk than is possible with present test methods.

UPDATE: It’s also included in Time Magazine’s list of ‘Top 10 Medical Breakthroughs’ for the year.

Geraldo Rivera, host of the Fox network’s “Geraldo at Large,” will present a one-hour news special on December 27 at 10pm EST (repeating on December 28 at 1am) to discuss “the imminent need for action” for the hundreds of thousands of Americans with disabilities who have been waiting years for government services. Promotional video here.

In 1972, Rivera brought television cameras inside the Willowbrook State School on New York’s Staten Island and filmed widespread abuse and neglect occurring there. The institution housed more than 5,000 people with intellectual and developmental disabilities at that time. Rivera’s reports led to government investigations of the institution, which was eventually shut down.

Rivera said funding for community services and community-based homes, intended to take the place of institutions, has not kept pace with needs. Consequently, waiting lists of more than 285,000 people in at least 21 states have emerged as the new problem or the “new institution” for people with disabilities.

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Video from the New York Times:

There are roughly 1 million people with disabilities in Afghanistan, most of them victims of war. Many cannot find work and must beg on the streets to support themselves. State hospitals cannot afford to treat them, so they rely instead on people like Alberto Cairo (above), an Italian physiotherapist who has been running a Red Cross center in Afghanistan for almost two decades. Cairo employs people with disabilities to make prosthetic devices.

Says Cairo: “I am not a very deep thinker. I think there are people who are happy if I stay, so I want to stay.”

From the blog of the American Association of People with Disabilities:

A group of eight disability advocacy organizations this week pressed the incoming Obama administration for a greater voice in decision-making for people with disabilities as well as high-level appointments.

In a letter sent this week, the groups maintained that the incoming administration had not reached out to disability advocacy organizations in seeking appointees to the new administration. They asked for the inclusion of a “qualified person with a disability, who is an expert in disability policy,” to serve on the president’s domestic policy staff.

The groups criticized the incoming administration’s appointments to date, saying they “do not reflect a concerted effort” to include qualified candidates with disabilities in senior positions in the new administration.

“The participation of qualified people with disabilities in shaping policy is critical to the success of the programs and services that enhance our lives,” they said.

Among the signatories were the American Association of People with Disabilities and the Special Olympics.

The full text of the letter follows.

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Elevate disability policy within the White House Domestic Policy Council

From Rud and Ann Turnbull, co-founders and co-directors
Beach Center on Disability
The University of Kansas

Background

The audacity of hope lies in the heart of the disability community.

The insistence on rights is still part of its daily agenda.

As individuals with disabilities and their families perform their civic responsibilities, they prove that rights create opportunities for effective citizenship.

The integration of disability policy into other policies can threaten individuals and families affected by disabilities; there are no assurances that policy reforms will always be disability-sensitive and provide for reasonable accommodations or other means for equal treatment.

But the integration of disability policy also creates opportunities because policy-integration advances integration and full participation of people with disabilities.

Individuals with disabilities and their families need a change they can believe in – a change that only President Obama and his leadership team can offer.

They need the opportunity to participate as equals in domestic policy debates.

So, we propose elevating disability policy.

Proposal

The President should create a Disability Policy Section within the White House Domestic Policy Council.

The Disability Policy Section should have the same status, opportunities, responsibilities, and staffing as policy sections related to all other major areas of domestic policy.

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