There are one billion people with disabilities worldwide with a majority living below the poverty line and the development organizations should keep their needs in view while making plans for the future.
People with disabilities, especially women and children, faced many hurdles to join the mainstream society and their needs were often given a low priority in the rigid social customs of the world.
According to a report of Human Rights Watch (HRW), it was a common practice in many parts of the world to isolate, abuse, and deny the basic human rights to these vulnerable groups.
The report said, “Women and children with disabilities are particularly vulnerable to discrimination”, while adding that persons with disabilities (PWD) experienced multiple discrimination – due to their disability and their age or gender.
“Women and children with disabilities are vulnerable to human rights abuses not only because of disability but also because of their age or gender,” said Amanda McRae, disability rights researcher at the HRW.
The report said that PWD faced gender-based violence as women and girls with disabilities were also the victims of heightened risk of physical and other abuse because of their limitations in physical mobility, communication barriers and isolation from the mainstream society. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) estimated that children with disabilities constituted more than one-third of the 67 million children who were out of schools worldwide, the report added.
In many parts of the world, children with disabilities had been subjected to violence in schools by the disciplinary tactics of teachers or bullying by classmates.
In a survey of corporal punishment in the United States (U.S), the HRW found that in many jurisdictions teachers were more likely to use corporal punishment, such as paddling or hitting, on children with disabilities than on their non-disabled peers, the report pointed out.
Children with disabilities frequently faced abuses in psychiatric institutions, orphanages and other social care facilities throughout the world.
