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…)

The headline on a story by Rob Hotakainen in the Wichita Eagle describes the Prenatally and Postnally Diagnosed Conditions Awareness Act as an “abortion bill.” The measure, co-sponsored by Sens. Sam Brownback (R-Kansas), at left, and Edward Kennedy (D-Massachusetts), would provide for accurate medical information to be offered to parents who receive a diagnosis of a disability either before birth or up to a year after the birth of a child.

Hotakainen describes the bill as one that “aims to reduce the number of abortions tied to genetic disorders.” He says Brownback views the bill as part of his campaign for “the culture of life,” and describes Brownback as saying that “children with special needs are viewed as being specially touched by God” in some cultures. Kennedy’s office declined to comment on the legislation, which passed a Senate committee recently. An excerpt:

“We’re just saying, instead of killing the children, let them live,” Brownback said … Currently, Brownback said, 90 percent of pregnancies are aborted when a genetic test shows that a fetus will develop into a child with Down syndrome, spina bifida, cystic fibrosis or dwarfism.

… “I’d like to see it come way down,” Brownback said. “I think these children are beautiful and sacred children, and they should be allowed the chance to live.”

(more…)

From the Atlanta Journal-Constitution:

Two years ago, Georgia Army National Guard soldiers spurred an effort to bring a baby with spina bifida from Iraq to Atlanta for surgery.

Now back at home with her grandmother Soad in Baghdad, Noor’s future remains uncertain. Her family has been targeted by insurgents for taking help from Americans. Noor al-Zahra is paralyzed from the waist down. Soad worries about how she will be able to provide adequate care for her granddaughter. The child’s parents divorced shortly after the surgery, and her father has since remarried.

Earlier story here.

Related story: ‘Baby Miracle’ recovering from surgery

From the Tampa Tribune, USA Today:

A baby girl who was born with severe deformities in Samoa and refused medical treatment in New Zealand has been brought to Florida for surgery with the help of THORN Ministries, an American faith-based group.

Miracletina Nanai, also known as ‘Baby Miracle,‘ is now six months old. (At left, with Kristin Taylor, left, and her mother, Mikaele Nanai.) Miracletina reportedly has deformities of the face, brain, spinal cord and palate, and is missing some fingers. After birth, doctors advised family and staff at the hospital not to feed her, but her parents reportedly snuck in milk and fed her with a plastic syringe when the nurses weren’t watching.

Because Samoa doesn’t have medical facilities needed to correct her disabilities, the country appealed to nearby New Zealand for help. But the New Zealand government denied the baby’s family an entry visa in December, saying there was no treatment that would benefit her quality of life.

Kristin Taylor, co-founder of THORN Ministries of Riverview, Florida, worked to get U.S. approval of visas and passports so the baby’s family could travel to Florida for up to six months. The approvals came after John Ragheb, chief of pediatric neurosurgery at Miami Children’s Hospital, and S. Anthony Wolfe, chief of the hospital’s plastic surgery division, agreed to provide medical services for the baby free of charge through the Child Foundation Inc.

(more…)

He turned his wheelchair into a super skateboard and a new sport was born

From ESPN sports on ABC News, a story with amazing video about a teenager from Las Vegas who created his own sport. He calls it “hard-core sitting.” Sixteen-year-old Aaron Fotheringham does spins and tricks in his wheelchair that would make any skateboarder envious. Check the video for his signature move: the back flip.

Thanks to exposure on Youtube and a relationship with the wheelchair company Colours in Motion, Fotheringham has become an international sensation. He has spina bifida.