Edit: My Blogging Against Disablism day contribution on this issue is now up here: “BADD: The radical notion that people with disabilities are people, and Australia’s 2020 Summit”
~~~
A couple of things I noticed about the Health section of the initial report from the 2020 Summit:
- There was no mention of patient autonomy or respect or rights
- There was no mention of poverty and social inequality as determinants of health (aside from indigeneity)
- And there was no mention of sexuality, reproductive justice or reproductive health – in any way or in any form. We are unsexed bodies, and invisible women (in fact the word “women” appears only three times in the entire report).
The rest of my comments I’m writing up for Blogging Against Disablism Day. Do join in with BADD.
One thing I was wondering:
- Were there any people with disabilities participating in the summit? There were 1000 participants. They seem to have gone to some effort to ensure a gender balance in the participants (if not in the chairs), and to ensure there was Indigenous representation in the stream on Indigenous affairs. According to the ABS, of the total population aged between 5 and 64 years, 19 per cent have some form of disability. Older than that, the numbers rise sharply. So we’d expect quite a few people with disabilities amongst the Summit participants, wouldn’t we? Especially in the Health stream?
…right?
[hat tip to Larvatus Prodeo]
pwd aren’t even afforded “token” status. the entirety of mainstream knowledge on pwd is as subjects of Hallmark movies. we are effectively invisible.
that’s not to say that it’s a special oppression or that it’s worse than any other. i just find it interesting that people don’t even think to “include” pwd to cover their asses, even people who do pay attention to race and gender in society.
amandaw’s last blog post..Hah
I sincerely hope that people with disabilities are actually mentioned more than in passing in the final report. Likewise your other points.
This kind of worries me too:
“Have health policy focused on prevention – across not just health, but across Government and the whole community, with “zero tolerance” of unhealthy actions”.
Who gets to decide what’s healthy and unhealthy? What would be the consequences of disobeying zero tolerance policies?
[...] of his own MPs to generate policy initiatives? etc etc. Lauredhel’s post last night expressed her first-impression reservations with the report from the Health stream. No doubt there will be many reservations expressed over all the reports as people have a chance to [...]
L,
I’ll be BADD!
BTW: This inquiry to review employment strategies is relevant and submissions close 2008-06-30: enough time to read the range of BADD posts and flesh out your ideas.
The inquiry is also calling for “tell us your story” submissions, and has already identified the need to look at how transport difficulties, the costs of managing our conditions, and the unpredictable ups-and-downs affect career options.
If anyone feels like sanity-checking/criticizing my initial thoughts here to help me prepare my own submission, please do so.
Dave Bath’s last blog post..VoxEU: Will we ever learn?
[...] More from Andrew Bartlett, Andrew Norton, Lauredhel, Derek Barry, Gary Sauer-Thompson, gatewatching, tigtog and John Quiggin. Bartlett also has a large [...]
I saw two delegates in wheelchairs, though I didn’t chat with them, so I’m not sure which streams they were in. Also, you might want to check out one of the recommendations out of the Communities stream, which was a national disability insurance scheme.
Andrew Leigh’s last blog post..Productive in Pink
More on the idea of a national catastrophic-injury scheme in my post to come. It all plays into the good crip/bad crip stereotype dichotomy.
amandaw, La Di Da: exactly.
[...] Lauredhel gives a few quick observations, including the apparent absence of many people with disabilities. [...]
There was at least one participant with a guide dog, and the co-chair of the stream I was in has very limited mobility (crutches/wheelchair).
[...] Lauredhel gives a few quick observations, including the apparent absence of many people with disabilities. [...]