From UPI:

A new study in the journal Pediatrics (free article) found that the financial impact of raising a child with a disability varies widely between states, depending on each state’s Medicaid and State Children’s Health Insurance Program. The study also found that low income families spend a disproportionally large share of their income on their child’s care.

“Policy makers should consider ways to strengthen Medicaid and the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) to reduce the financial burdens these families shoulder,” said Paul Shattuck, a professor of social work at Washington University in St. Louis and one of the study’s authors.

See also:

Wide variation in state Medicaid and SCHIP policies determine financial burden for low-income families with special health care needs children (with video) – Washington University in St. Louis News and Information

From the Associated Press:

Social Security officials say they expect an unprecedented wave of new disability claim applications, as aging and injured baby boomers lose their jobs in the recession. There are worries that the extraordinary increase will add to processing delays that have plagued the agency for years.

It’s expected that the agency will receive 3.3 million new claims in the next year, an estimate that’s grown by 300,000 claims in just the past few months. The number of people waiting to have a claim processed is up 30 percent since last fall, to more than 736,000.

Making matters worse, at least 10 states have furloughed the federally-funded employees who process benefit claims.

“We’re going to be moving backwards this year, the question is how much,” Social Security Commissioner Michael Astrue said in an interview. “The trend line isn’t good.”

UCLA graduate student Victor Pineda calls on the United Arab Emirates to implement the United Nations’ Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. Pineda, who participated in negotiating the treaty, is the 2009 Fulbright-Hays Fellow at the Dubai School for Government.

From The National newspaper in Abu Dhabi:

Often considered a burden on the community, disabled persons are regularly isolated and stigmatised by society, while the gifts these citizens could give their communities are wasted. Studies prove that progressive public policies towards those with special needs benefit all citizens.

… Providing work opportunities and education for people with special needs is not enough, we need their active involvement in the decisions that affect them. We need their voices and their vision and we need them to become self-sufficient and to contribute to their community.

Many countries have started this process and the UAE can too. This, according to indicators by the World Bank, brings benefits to the disabled individual, to their household and to various sectors of government.

Disability Bitch, satirical columnist for BBC Ouch!, responds to suggestions that people with disabilities are a financial drain on society. Triggering her ire: A recent report by the Royal National Institute for Blind People (RNIB) that blindness costs the UK £6.5 billion a year. An excerpt:

Given that shocking revelation, it seems only natural to announce that I HATE BLIND PEOPLE and I’d like to ask that you all please give up sight loss and acquire a cheaper impairment, if you will. There’s a recession on, in case you didn’t realise. And you know who is footing the cost of your extravagantly expensive disabling condition? It’s me, the taxpayer, that’s who. Give it back.

… I’ve compiled my own study on this issue. I was trying to work out the cheapest way to be crippled. That way, we can all take it into account in our next lives, and maybe find our way toward being economy class handicappers, rather than selfishly hogging all the money with our complex impairment needs.

Somewhat startlingly, my research has also led me to conclude that every single human being on this planet is a drain on resources of one form or another and that we’d all be cheaper dead. Yes, the Normals too. I hope you can see how selfish the very act of being alive is. There’s a lesson there for all of us.

From the New York Times:

A national survey finds that the economic crisis has dealt a heavy blow to the estimated 44 million Americans who care for an aging or disabled relative or spouse.

One in six caregivers surveyed by the National Alliance for Caregiving and Evercare, a division of the UnitedHealth Group,  said they had lost a job during the downturn. Some 21 percent said they had to share housing with family members to save money. At the same time, government and non-profit organizations that usually provide relief are being cut in the downturn.

Teresa Denk, 59, who provides constant care for her 92-year-old father in Rainbow City, AL, said she is unable to work fulltime while caring for her father. The money she could make working part-time would not be enough to pay for home care. Ms. Denk said, “Agencies charge a minimum of $15 an hour … I might be able to earn $8 to $10 an hour.”

See also:

Most carers ‘hit breaking point’ – BBC News

Earlier post here.

From the AP/Chattanooga Times Free Press, Tennesseean:

The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation reports a dramatic rise in hate crimes in the state last year. Crimes against people with disabilities rose 88 percent to 42 total offenses, as  the total number of hate crimes in the state rose 38 percent to 515 in 2008.

Most of the hate crimes against people with disabilities involved theft, assault and burglaries. Experts said the increase could be attributed to the poor economy.

“When people are feeling desperate and pressured in times like these … you’re going to try to find the most vulnerable person to victimize,” said Carol Westlake, executive director of the Tennessee Disability Coalition.

… “I think we sort of overall are seeing, particularly in Tennessee, a little bit of a general backlash against people with disabilities,” Westlake said. “I think that has to do with state budget crisis and money being tight everywhere.

“There’s this underlying message that too often people with disabilities aren’t as valued because there’s a perception they’re not contributing to society and the economics of the state,” making victimization easier, she said.

Columnist Jane Glenn Haas writes in the Orange County [CA] Register that a new survey reveals caregivers for people with disabilities “are facing escalating financial and emotional hardships that are rarely, if ever, addressed in national debates about funding health care.” Some 44 million Americans are responsible for the care of a spouse or parent.

An excerpt:

A survey conducted by Evercare [a national health care coordination program of UnitedHealthcare] and the [nonprofit] National Alliance for Caregiving concludes 43 percent of caregivers have taken a pay cut or have been forced to work fewer hours as a result of the recession.

Some have taken on additional jobs or are able to work more hours, but almost 50 percent told surveyors they have exhausted their savings and 43 percent have had to borrow money to continue caregiving.

(more…)