Disability in China

Impact

What did disabled youths experience at the peak of infection?
(In Chinese, Jan, We are a minority)

6 disabled people share their covid experiences (In Chinese, 2022)

Back to contents.

Response

Shanghai Covid lockdown: The struggle of blind massage therapists (2022, BBC)

310,000 seniors living alone in Shanghai and young people who help them (in Chinese, 2022, QQ)

Back to contents.

Today, I don't want to advocate "disability prevention", what about you? (2022, translated by google) Minority Talk

Back to contents.

Braille

New doors open for the visually impaired a feature on use of Braille in China. (2022, China Daily)

Back to contents.

This one-woman show by a disabled woman has made my dream come true. “I have always dreamed that one day, someone can bring the most real disabled people, the most real lives, the most real feelings and the most real needs of disabled people to the stage for all the public to see.” (In Chinese, quote via Google Translate, Jun, The Paper)

Back to contents.

Overview

Atlas of Classified Disability: Spatial Statistics and Pattern (May, CCDC Weekly)

Report on disability data with a focus on employment. (In Chinese, Feb, JSTV)

Correlation between functional disability and quality of life among rural elderly in Anhui province,: a cross-sectional study. (2022, BMC Public Health)

Back to contents.

Research

Book review of Disability in Contemporary China. Tracing representations of disability from Mao to now. (2022, Disability Studies Community Blog)

Back to contents.

Artificial Intelligence

Good for tech: Disability expertise and labor in China's artificial intelligence sector (Feb, First Monday)

Back to contents.

Social Media

Changing attitudes toward disability, one vlog at a time (2022, Shine)

Back to contents.

Overview

Disability inclusion key to rural revitalization. On how China's poverty alleviation measures supported persons with disabilities: “between 2014 and 2019, the registered number of persons with disabilities living in extreme poverty fell from 7.19 million to 479,000, and reached zero by 2021.” (2022, China Daily)

Back to contents.

Social Protection

The effect of a disability-targeted cash transfer program on universal health coverage and universal access to education: A nationwide cohort study of Chinese children and adolescents with disabilities. (2022, The Lancet Regional Health)

Back to contents.

Investigation of sexual assault case at a school for disabled children in Hubei Province (In Chinese, Jun, Weixin)

Discussion on Families We Need Erin Raffety's book on Disability, Abandonment, and Foster Care's Resistance in Contemporary China. (Podcast without transcript, Mar, New Books Network)

Back to contents.

Supported employment helps people with Down syndrome find jobs (Mar, Xinhua News)

Back to contents.

Maoism and mental illness: psychiatric institutionalization during the Chinese Cultural Revolution. (2022, History of Psychiatry)

Back to contents.

For people with mental health conditions finding work remains a challenge. (2022, Sixth Tone)

Back to contents.

Young people in Guangzhou commute in electric wheelchairs as e-bikes face tighter rules. ‘The electric wheelchair “saves effort and is flexible, and you can ‘drive’ directly to your destination without having to find a parking space”’ (Jul, The Straits Times)

Back to contents.

Draft law to improve accessible facilities under review. (2022, China Daily)

Input to the UN Committee highlights areas of concern in consideration of the government’s compliance with its obligations under the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. (2022, Human Rights Watch)

Disability Inclusion in China an overview helpdesk report. "The disability movement in China has been disproportionately affected by the Charity Law and Overseas NGO Law, which have necessitated a move from advocacy towards service provision. " (link to pdf, 2021, SD Direct)

Back to contents.

The lowdown on on being disabled in China. With accompanying podcast:

“the perception of disability has changed a lot from my childhood. Now the group of people with disability is more diverse. So, some people are well educated and so they work for some big IT companies which are more open for us. And more importantly is that people with a disability can go outside to use the public transportation and also go shopping, and so the common people become more familiar with them. [...]”

“There were many public demonstrations before 2012, some of them legal, some of them illegal, and many of them broken up by the police. I remember there was a huge demonstration of wheelchair users in Anhui Province in about 2009 for various reasons, because people were being denied accessible homes. So, there was a big public movement at that time. And that’s all stopped. You do not see public activism or protest any longer in China. But what you do get is people working in much more subtle ways. ” (podcast, with transcript, Mar, BBC) (2022, BBC)

Government paper on China's Parasports: Progress and the Protection of Rights. “The remarkable achievements of parasports in China reflect both the sportsmanship and sporting prowess of the disabled, and the progress China is making in human rights and national development.” (2022, Xinhua)

Disabled Chinese Fight for Equal Rights Despite Paralympic Glory. (2022, NYT) “Even China’s most decorated Paralympians have faced discrimination.” Sure, yes, as have decorated Paralympians in every other country?

China is a Paralympics star, but its people with disabilities face high hurdles (2022, NPR)

China excels at the Paralympics, "but its disabled citizens are fighting for access." Like many other countries doing well at the Paralympics, eh. (2022, NPR)

Beijing 2022 promotes accessibility for Paralympians (2022, CGTN)

Back to contents.