Category: Uncategorized

(Huffington Post)
August 9, 2012

STRATFORD, NEW JERSEY– [Excerpt provided by Inclusion Daily Express] The 3-year-old girl who sparked a national debate over whether “mental retardation” should be grounds for denying a patient an organ transplant, will receive a new kidney.

Amelia Rivera was initially denied the transplant by Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia because the same genetic disorder that caused her kidneys to fail also left her severely cognitively impaired, and unable to walk or talk. While she would die without a transplant, doctors originally said, a cascade of other health problems might well shorten her life even with one. The decision was made to not place her on the organ recipient list.

Her parents argued that this was tantamount to discrimination based on her mental capabilities. They never asked that Amelia receive an organ from a stranger but did not understand why she could not receive one from a relative, known as a designated donation. After they took their plea to the internet, and more than 50,000 signed a Change.org petition and joined #TeamAmelia on Twitter, the hospital agreed that family and friends could be tested to find a match.

On the website of WolfHirschorn.org — the support group for the syndrome that Amelia has — her mother, Chrissy, announced yesterday that she would be her daughter’s donor.

Entire article:
Amelia Rivera, Girl Who Sparked Debate Over Transplants And ‘Mental Retardation’, To Receive New Kidney From Mom
http://tinyurl.com/ide0809121a
Related:
With Transplant Approved by Hospital, Amelia Rivera’s Mom to Donate Kidney (Babble.com)
http://tinyurl.com/ide0809121b
Kidney Chronicles Part Three (Blog Post by Chrissy Rivera)
http://wolfhirschhorn.org/2012/08/amelia/kidney-chronicles-part-three/

(New York Times)
August 9, 2012

LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA– [Excerpt provided by Inclusion Daily Express] Students with disabilities are almost twice as likely to be suspended from school as nondisabled students, with the highest rates among black children with disabilities.

According to a new analysis of Department of Education data, 13 percent of disabled students in kindergarten through 12th grade were suspended during the 2009-10 school year, compared with 7 percent of students without disabilities. Among black children with disabilities, which included those with learning difficulties, the rate was much higher: one out of every four was suspended at least once that school year.

The Center for Civil Rights Remedies at the University of California, Los Angeles, conducted the study of data from the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights, which originally released the raw statistics in March.

Policy makers and civil rights leaders worry about out-of-school suspensions because they often presage dropouts and can raise a child’s risk of future incarceration. Districts with high suspension rates also tend to be correlated with lower student achievement as measured by test scores.

The analysis, which reviewed data at the state and district levels, found that in 10 states, including California, Connecticut, Delaware and Illinois, more than a quarter of black students with disabilities were suspended in 2009-10. In Illinois, the rate was close to 42 percent, compared with about 8 percent for white students.

Entire article:
Suspensions Are Higher for Disabled Students, Federal Data Indicate
http://tinyurl.com/ide0809123a
Related:
State schools suspend students at higher rates than average, study finds (Los Angeles Times)
http://tinyurl.com/ide0809123b

There’s a quote by the Russian poet Vladimir Mayakovsky that I’ve always loved:

 

“Love’s boat has been shattered against the life of everyday. You and I are quits, and it’s useless to draw up a list of mutual hurts, sorrows, and pains.”

 

I have lately begun to think of this in relation to the United States. You and I are quits, for I don’t recognize a country where stepping on the necks of the poor is considered acceptable. 

 

Listen Old Thing, you shattered your constitution and threw away your moral chemise.

 

And Thorstein Veblen and Walt Whitman are probably drunk in the afterlife. 

 

Our friend Andrea Scarpino brought this blog post by Phillipa Willits to our attention. Ms. Willitts writes about the slew of disability inspiration advertisements and images that are currently going around in cyber-land, portraits of cheery disabled people overcoming their afflictions because they have fabulous attitudes. The idea that you can overcome a disability with a “fab” attitude is reductionist and of course just too easy. Here’s a quote we like:

“What’s more, as long as non-disabled people can happily dismiss disability as a matter of attitude, they then have no need to start tackling the real causes of disability such as inaccessibility and discrimination. That disabled woman who complained because she couldn’t attend your inaccessible meeting? She’s just got a bad attitude! A good attitude would presumably have magicked up a ramp and large-print leaflets.”

From our good friend Scott Lissner at Ohio State University:

 

I would like to encourage   you to support the National Forum on Disability Issues.  The nonpartisan forum is the only event of its kind where the Presidential Candidates are invited to share their public policies which affect the 54 million people with disabilities in the United States.

The National Forum will be held on September 28, 2012 in Columbus Ohio and will also be webcast live across the country. (Note, since this event is held in Ohio the two Ohio candidates for U.S. Senate have also been invited to participate.) To date, there are more than 50 co-sponsors of the event, mostly national disability organizations. Attached are invitations sent to the Presidential Candidates, a current list of sponsors and a FAQ.  Beyond promoting the event and possible sponsorship you can encourage others to write, e-mail or call the Campaign offices of President Obama, Governor Romney telling them:

• You hope they will demonstrate their commitment by personally participating the forum instead of sending their staff
• You hope they will address both broad disability issues (Education, Employment, Transportation, health care, Social Security…) as well as (list issues important to you such as financial aid supporting students with disabilities,  accessible textbooks,  captioning, universal design…) that are particularly important to me. 

 

To contact the campaigns:

•             Obama: http://www.barackobama.com/contact-us/call-write

•             Romney: http://www.mittromney.com/forms/other

 

 

You can contact  Susan Hetrick for more details on sponsorship or the event.   

 

Susan Hetrick

Director of Public Policy/The Ability Center

Coordinator/Ohio Disability Vote Coalition

614-575-8055

866-575-8055 (toll free)

 

When the day opens the dog opens. Opens before you do. Sees the beautiful objects all around the room. Can’t resist waking you. Puts her front paws on your chest. 

 

Note to self: find out how dogs wake each other in the wild. Maybe they all wake at once. Probably waking human beings is a different order of business than waking the pack. Of course it is.

 

Oh but the day is open. And because guide dogs are on a schedule, a daily calendar that reflects a working life, they must eat first thing. Then it’s a trip outside, often before daylight, and without regard for the weather. We are awake and outside and its raining and by God the day is good. 

 

When you’re up, you’re up. And there’s a day of linked occasions opening all around the man and dog.  

 

When the lake opens the loon opens,

she sees a perch nosing wild rice.

Lawrence Downes’ essay “Erasing the Past at the Ghost Hospital” makes for good reading if you’re interested in dark tourism. The Kings Point mental hospital, now in advanced ruins, is proving to be an attractive destination for people who view mental illness through Hollywood lenses–perhaps they see David Caruso with a gas mask as they walk the paths of what was essentially a concentration camp for the mentally ill? In America we like to make things gothic with a small g, rather than see what our most segregationist impulses have always been about. Today the largest mental hospital in the US is the Los Angeles County jail system. Any tourists up for visiting that?

 

 

Protesters Demonstrate To Educate After Man Arrested Over Service Dog
(KARK-TV)
August 6, 2012

LITTLE ROCK, ARKANSAS– [Excerpt provided by Inclusion Daily Express] “They have information taken straight from the ADA website,” said Charles Lott because he said, the library violated those rights when they arrested a disabled man with a service dog at the library last week.

“We’re trying to show them that someone was harassed and his basic rights were denied,” said Lott.

On the library’s security footage we first showed you Wednesday, you can see Terry “Grizz” Hayhurst with his service dog, Nia, who is trained in balance assistance as Hayhurst suffers from a spinal cord injury.

Hayhurst said he was asked questions regarding his disability that were not allowed under ADA regulations.

Library officials said he was escorted out and later arrested for not cooperating.

The protest Sunday was to show solidarity for what activists said is an injustice.

Entire article:
Protesters Want More Knowledge Of Disability Discrimination
http://arkansasmatters.com/fulltext?nxd_id=568762
Related: 
Disabled Man Arrested After Debate Over Service Dog at Little Rock Library
http://arkansasmatters.com/fulltext?nxd_id=566602

PEW Report: Americans Living with Disability and their Technology Profile

http://g3ict.org/resource_center/publications_and_reports/p/productCategory_whitepapers/subCat_7/id_237