From the Houston Chronicle:

Michelle Colvard, the reigning Ms. Wheelchair America, is touring the nation to challenge stereotypes about women with disabilities. The 32-year-old Colvard also serves as executive director of the mayor’s office for people with disabilities in Houston.

In a Q&A, Colvard says she wants the public to stop seeing women with disabilities as victims or heroes, and just relate to them as people like everybody else. She’d also like to see improvements in employment, housing and transportation. An excerpt:

Q: What is one of your most heartwarming moments as Ms. Wheelchair America?

A: I got to go on the ice for the Houston Aeros game as Ms. Wheelchair Texas. I had a little table during intermission to sign autographs. At one point, I went through this line of little girls, and they’re like, “Ms. Wheelchair, I need your autograph.” All of a sudden, I was mobbed.

I grew up with my peers treating me a certain way. Back then, if those kids would have been exposed to this kind of figure — an image that portrayed a strong, confident, attractive woman who just happened to have a disability — I don’t think they would have treated someone who is in a wheelchair differently.

When I realized that, I started getting choked up.

From the Columbus [Ohio] Dispatch:

Preparing to anchor the presidential forum on disability issues, broadcaster Judy Woodruff says her 26-year-old son Jeffrey, who has spina bifida, has opened her eyes to the way the world looks from a wheelchair.

Having somebody in the family who is disabled is a lesson every day — in humanity and how much we shouldn’t take for granted.

Jeffrey was only mildly impaired by his condition until a routine surgery at age 16 caused unexpected complications. He emerged with profound disabilities, and cannot walk or use the right side of his body. He’s now a student at a small college in North Carolina.

Woodruff is senior correspondent and 2008 political editor for The NewsHour With Jim Lehrer on PBS.

The country has come a long way since the Americans With Disabilities Act was passed in 1990. Having said that, just look around and you can see we have a long way to go. The disabled still can’t get into some places, some stores and many homes.

Of course, there’s such a wide variety of disabilities — hearing, visual, physical, a cane or a wheelchair, developmental delays. Part of what the disabled community has to do is educate society about the vast differences and that many with disabilities are perfectly capable of holding down a job and learning.

(PBS photo)

From the Baltimore Sun:

Nineteen-year-old Tatyana McFadden, a wheelchair sprint racer from Maryland, is among a growing number of athletes with disabilities who are being sought out by corporate America for sponsorships. A member of the U.S. Paralympic team, McFadden is being featured on 100 million drinking cups in McDonald’s restaurants across the country, and is also featured in a television commercial for Hilton Hotels Corp.

As unseemly behavior among able-bodied athletes has become more prevalent in recent years, corporate America has increased its efforts to reach out to athletes with disabilities, said Dave Rosenberg, executive vice president of GMR Marketing, a San Francisco firm that matched McFadden with Hilton.

McFadden was born in Russia with spina bifida and spent her first six years in an orphanage. Unable to walk, she got around on her hands. She was adopted and brought to the United States by Deborah McFadden, a commissioner for disabilities in the U.S. Department of Health and Human services.

As a high school student, McFadden successfully sued for the right to share the track with teammates in Howard County, then testified in support of state legislation requiring schools to provide disabled students access to sports programs. That bill passed in April.

See also: Georgia man is first Iraq veteran to qualify for Paralympics — Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

(Hilton photo of Tatyana McFadden)

From the Sydney [Australia] Morning Herald:

Expectant mothers will be able to insure their unborn babies against pregnancy complications, birth defects and even death under a new policy offered by insurance giant ING. The program is called the first of its kind in Australia, possibly the world, and will be aimed at the growing population of older mothers. Premiums rise with the age of the mother.

The policy will pay $50,000 to mothers whose children have disabilities such as blindness and deafness or other congenital malformations, including spina bifida, Down syndrome, cleft palate and heart disorders.

A spokeswoman for an Australian midwives association criticized the new program. “Insurance companies are going to go wherever they can to make a buck,” she said. “Fifty thousand dollars is not going to go very far in caring for a sick child. It is marketing fear and uncertainty when women are vulnerable during pregnancy.”

From the Washington Post:

The Maryland General Assembly passed a bill Monday night that will require county boards of education to allow students with disabilities to have equal opportunities to participate in physical education programs and on mainstream athletic teams.

The Fitness and Athletics Equity for Students with Disabilities Act came about in part because of Tatyana McFadden, 18, a wheelchair athlete from Atholton High in Howard County.

“We’ve been fighting so long and so hard for this. People should have the same opportunities. They shouldn’t be denied,” said McFadden, a senior who had lobbied in Annapolis on the bill’s behalf.

McFadden, born with spina bifida, is training for the 2008 Paralympics, which will take place in Beijing in September. She won two medals at the 2004 Paralympics in Athens.

Earlier post here.

Brownback and Kennedy do the right thing

By Wesley J. Smith in the Weekly Standard:

It is a bitter irony that even as we are enlarging our commitment to human equality in many areas, we are turning our backs on it in others. In particular, we may be about to eliminate from our society people with Down syndrome (DS) and other genetically caused disabilities.

With the development of prenatal genetic diagnosis, the drive toward eugenics has returned with a vengeance. Americans may heartily cheer participants in the Special Olympics, but we abort some 90 percent of all gestating infants diagnosed with genetic disabilities such as DS, dwarfism, and spina bifida.

… What Kennedy and Brownback hope to provide to parents of genetically disabled babies is the legal assurance that they will be provided information that is complete and informed — rather than counseling tainted by prejudice, ignorance, or fear. The Prenatally and Postnatally Diagnosed Condition Awareness Act may have a clunky name, but it is a noble and practical bill that deserves the support not only of those ideological opposites Kennedy and Brownback — but also of everybody in between.

Urges legislators to allow students with disabilities to compete alongside typical peers

From the Baltimore Sun:

Tatyana McFadden, an internationally recognized Paralympic athlete, is lobbying lawmakers in Annapolis to ensure that athletes with disabilities can compete alongside their non-disabled peers.

McFadden, a high school senior who earlier sued for the right to share the track with her classmates in Howard County, told a Senate committee that “no student should have to fight to be accepted in high school.”

McFadden was among those who spoke in favor of a bill that would require schools to allow athletes with disabilities to play wheelchair basketball or tennis, to swim or to otherwise play sports among themselves or side-by-side with able-bodied students.

(more…)