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Activists seek priority in treatment, vaccination for persons with disabilities
Department of empowerment of persons with disabilities seeks directions to states after the National Federation of the Blind complained that people with visual impairment had to stand in long queues to get tested, vaccinated and get treatment for Covid-19
Following complaints from rights activists and organisations, the department of empowerment of persons with disabilities has requested the Union health ministry to issue directions to states to give priority to people with disabilities in treatment and vaccination for Covid-19.
Bring scheme to vaccinate disabled, Karnataka HC tells state
However, no specific mention is made of special preference to persons with disabilities, though laws relating to them empowers the government to protect their rights, the petitioner pleaded.
Puducherry: Vision impaired more vulnerable to Covid, shows study
PUDUCHERRY: People with blindness and low vision are more vulnerable to Covid-19 infection and have a disadvantage of not receiving sufficient information about the infection, a survey by Aravind Eye Hospital in Puducherry showed.
Special arrangements at Covid vaccine centres for disabled
CHENNAI: The State government on Monday informed the Madras High Court that exclusive counters will be provided for persons with disabilities (PwDs) at Covid vaccination centres across the State. Chief Justice Sanjib Banerjee and Justice Senthilkumar Ramamoorthy directed the State to take immediate steps to ensure that such counters are accessible to PwDs.
The bench passed the interim order on a PIL moved by Meenakshi Balasubramanian, a disability rights activist, seeking to add disabled persons to the priority group.
Website to the aid of special-needs children
A website of the Samagra Shiksha, Kerala, for children with special needs now has over 1,000 videos related to academics and life skills.
Visually-impaired to get free computers for their children
Amid dates being set for Class 10 and 12 board examinations, students face countless problems with online classes and studying from home. The situation is even tougher for rural students. In an effort to sighted children of visually-impaired parents in rural areas, a local NGO distributed desktops to them.
Chennai:
Visually impaired struggle with NCERT e-textbooks
Over 60% of NCERT chapters and over 95% of SCERT books are either totally or partially inaccessible.
For Class VII student Tejasvi Raj, doing his daily homework comes with the double challenge of being a visually impaired student in the COVID-19 era of virtual schooling. His screen reading software can’t access the PowerPoint presentation that his teachers had prepared for online school. E-textbooks provided on the government’s virtual platform DIKSHA, which it has promoted as a transformative resource for digital education, are not fully accessible either.
Radio Udaan': Visually impaired woman runs online radio platform for differently-abled
Hyderabad: With an aim to help differently-abled people, a Hyderabad-based visually impaired woman has set up an online radio platform for not just entertainment but also to give valuable information to the people.
Minal Singhvi, a woman from Hyderabad, who lost her vision at an age of 28 is now laying a path for other people with disabilities to reach heights. She said that awareness must be created among the public about people with disabilities.
Making elections accessible
Groups for differently-abled persons share their views on how to make the polling booths more disabled-friendly
Elections after elections, orthopedically-challenged K. Selvi would crawl to the polling booth at a government school in Vadakkarai near Red Hills. At the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the polling booth became a little less inaccessible, as it offered her a wheelchair. However, without a volunteer to push the wheelchair, Selvi’s sister ended up doing it, while holding her eight-month-old baby.
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