Disability news, February 2026, by country

2025 Was a Year of Collective Mourning for Disabled Communities. “If we can create and build on communal structures of care, we can hold that grief together more easily.” (Jan, Truthout)

In Climate Crisis and Environment:

Disability & Climate Change @COP30. “A public resource that aims to capture some of the deep and rich effort, research, advocacy, policy discussions, negotiations and progress made during COP30.” (2025, Sarah Boyd)

How Louis Braille’s musical notation system remains relevant 200 years after its invention. (Jan, ABC News)

In Conflict and Peace:

‘The system has failed’: Giles Duley’s mission to reframe disability in war. (2025, UN)

Disabled-led media will shape the future of journalism. Cara Reedy says:

“There is also a growing ecosystem of Disabled-led newsrooms, Disability Debrief, New Mobility, The Sick Times and our newsroom at the Disabled Journalists Association to name a few. These small newsrooms are covering disabled people in the most organic, rigorous and thorough way. They are experimenting with accommodations and work flows to create spaces that work for everyone while operating on small budgets. Disabled people are the ultimate system hackers. Imagine what they could do with full investment.” (Dec, Reframing Disability)

In Digital Accessibility and Technology:

Designing accessibility for real use, not dashboards:

“Treating accessibility as design work, grounded in real use and real contexts, allows teams to define success first and use metrics as supporting signals, not proxies.” (Jan)

Eric Bailey's predictions for the future of accessibility:

‘There will be concerted efforts to “solve” accessibility on the performative, contractual layer. This is in opposition to doing the in-the-trenches work to actually remove barriers.’ (Jan, Mantis & Co)

Digital Accessibility Ethics: Disability Inclusion in All Things Tech, an edited collection. (Jan, Law Office of Lainey Feingold)

Android accessibility updates include dark theme’s expanded option, Gemini in TalkBack and more. (2025, Google)

Digital Inclusion of Persons with Disabilities: Practical Framework and Toolbox. (2025, Inklusion Leben)

Public Statement Condemning Derogatory and Dehumanising Content Created at Targeting Persons with Albinism. (Jan, Africa Albinism Network)

TikTok Adds More Accessibility Features. (2025, SocialMedia Today)

This is our rhythm: academic becoming and realignment in deaf space. (2025, Deaf Studies and Deaf Education)

Global Disability Legislation Index: a “comprehensive guide to disability legislation across 100 countries, providing employers and employees with critical legal knowledge on disability inclusion.” (Jan, Valuable 500)

In International Cooperation:

Digital Inclusion of Persons with Disabilities: Practical Framework and Toolbox. (2025, Inklusion Leben)

In Policy and Rights:

In Space Exploration:

Engineer becomes first wheelchair user to go to space. (2025, BBC)

In Sport and Paralympics:

Unequal access to nature: Few outdoor spaces in Europe and the U.S. accommodate sensory, mental disabilities. (2025, Mongabay)

FIFA’s ticketing policy is excluding fans with disabilities from the 2026 World Cup. (2025, Football Supporters Europe)

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Africa

Egypt

New Braille-Accessible Public Library Opens in Maadi. (Jan, Cairo Scene)

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Ghana

Inclusive Finance in Action. “How Ghana’s Financial Sector is Learning to Serve Everyone” (2025, Inklusion leben)

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Kenya

High Court’s affirmation of persons with disabilities’ legal capacity a welcome step forward:

“the High Court affirmed that persons with disabilities have the right to obtain the services of private banks on an equal basis with all others, without being subjected to any additional restrictions and while being provided with relevant reasonable accommodations.” (2025, ICJ)

High Court’s affirmation of persons with disabilities’ legal capacity a welcome step forward:

“the High Court affirmed that persons with disabilities have the right to obtain the services of private banks on an equal basis with all others, without being subjected to any additional restrictions and while being provided with relevant reasonable accommodations.” (2025, ICJ)

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Mozambique

In Disaster Risk Reduction and Crisis Response:

People with disabilities need urgent protection amid deadly Mozambique floods. (Jan, Relief Web)

In International Cooperation:

Mozambique, China maintain close cooperation in supporting persons with disabilities:

“At the event, the Chinese Embassy in Mozambique donated wheelchairs, assistive devices, daily necessities, and food supplies valued at approximately 28,000 U.S. dollars to local persons with disabilities.” (2025, Xinhua)

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Nigeria

You can’t pick palm nuts without your hands getting oily: Coming to terms with the liberation and flaws of Deaf community in Nigeria. (Feb, Disability Debrief)

In Gender Equality and Women with Disabilities:

‘Every step a struggle:’ Nigerian woman with disabilities leads push for dignity and inclusion. (2025, UN)

In Humanitarian, Migrants and Refugees:

‘Every step a struggle:’ Nigerian woman with disabilities leads push for dignity and inclusion. (2025, UN)

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Sierra Leone

“I always climb the bench like a mountain”: The design failures shutting children with dwarfism out of Sierra Leone’s schools. (2025, Minority Africa)

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South Sudan

Disability groups call for inclusion in constitution-making process. (2025, Radio Tamazuj)

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Uganda

In Humanitarian, Migrants and Refugees:

Disabled Sudanese refugees in Uganda camps face aid vacuum, advocates say. (2025, Sudan Tribune)

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Asia

Armenia

Armenia's Disability Assessment Reform. “What Armenia has accomplished is not just a technical upgrade, but an institutional shift in how disability is perceived and addressed.” In particular:

“One of the most frequently cited improvements with the new system was the reduced risk of corruption. Multiple respondents, including OPDs, multilateral actors, and assessment professionals, stated that the digitalization and anonymity of the process have limited the scope for human manipulation and improved accountability. The implementation of a functionality score based on standardized criteria, rather than broad disability categories, was also seen as a major step toward objectivity and fairness”. (2025, Center for Inclusive Policy)

In Independent Living and Deinstitutionalization:

Creating caring homes for children with disabilities: “While society focuses on accessibility of public spaces, very little attention is paid to the most important space – the child’s own home”. (2025, EU Neighbours East)

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Bangladesh

In Humanitarian, Migrants and Refugees:

Frailty and disability among older adults residing in Rohingya refugee camp in Bangladesh (Jan, Aging and Health)

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India

A Swiss photographer’s journey to document accessibility in India. (2025, Telegraph India)

In the quiet world of words: “Through creativity, resilience and determination, Aditi Sowmyanarayan is reshaping perceptions of autism and neurodiversity, proving that expression comes in many forms”. (2025, Deccan Herald)

In Policy and Rights:

Indian Constitution is ableist. We need to confront its foundational gaps:

‘Disability remains a ground for “valid” discrimination within the Constitution, in which a person with disability can be removed from her office “for the reason of infirmity of mind and body”.’ (2025, The Indian Express)

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Indonesia

Celebrating inclusivity and creativity through Indonesia's batik traditions: “offers a pathway to independence and entrepreneurship for individuals with learning disabilities.” (2025, ILO)

Life Expectancy Falls, Disabilities Surge:

Disability and Due Process. Indonesia’s Updated Criminal Procedure Code Raises Questions about Access to Justice. (2025, Disability Justice Project)

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Israel

In Conflict and Peace:

Two brothers, one mission: Living with muscular dystrophy, they refuse to give up on the IDF:

“After his older brother proved it was possible, 18-year-old Aviel Yosef David followed his path to volunteer in uniform, showing that disability does not define contribution”. (2025, Ynet News)

Emerging from war, Israel’s disability system faces a defining test:

“The events of the past year have made clear that accessibility is not a niche issue but a national resilience measure. Emergencies expose weak points quickly: unreadable signage at clinics, inaccessible updates for people with sensory disabilities, insufficient transport options for those with mobility challenges and overstretched mental-health services.” (2025, JNS)

In Data and Research:

“As a result of the war, a significant increase was recorded in the number of people with disabilities in Israel. In 2024, approximately 1.32 million people with various disabilities were included in the registry, representing 13.1% of the total population, compared to approximately 1.163 million in 2023, who represented 11.7% of the population. Simultaneously, a sharp increase occurred in the number of disability benefit recipients from the National Insurance Institute, including those receiving benefits due to hostile actions, which rose from 4,200 in 2023 to 29,900 in 2024.” (Jan, Israel Hayom)

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Kazakhstan

In Assistive Technology:

Assistive Technologies Child’s Needs Assessment and Ecosystem in Kazakhstan. (2025, UNICEF)

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Myanmar

In Conflict and Peace:

Inclusion amid crisis: Ensuring the rights of persons with disabilities in post-coup Myanmar. (2025, International IDEA)

In Policy and Rights:

Myanmar’s disabled population faces diminishing rights, severe neglect under junta rule. (2025, Mizzima)

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Palestine

In Conflict and Peace:

The hidden struggles of people with disabilities in Gaza. “Israel’s genocide in Gaza has been cruel to disabled people, whose disabilities have been exacerbated by inadequate access to food, medicine, and support” (2025, Prism)

Falling within the Cracks: Situation of Persons with Disabilities in the occupied Palestinian territory:

“Throughout the protracted, decades-long cycle of violence and man-made humanitarian crises, people with disabilities have been at the highest risk of marginalization and exclusion” (2025, Relief Web)

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Syria

In Conflict and Peace:

Disability and the Political Afterlife of Violence: Reimagining Justice and Statehood in Post-Assad Syria:

“war-disabled Syrians are not merely passive victims; they are emerging as political actors. Through grassroots organizing, mutual aid networks, and advocacy campaigns, they are insisting on accessibility, inclusion, and accountability as foundational principles for Syria’s future. In doing so, they challenge binary narratives that cast them only as heroes or victims, asserting instead their right to shape the society they helped bring into being.” (2025, POMEPS)

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Thailand

Concerns raised over election accessibility for disabled voters in Thailand:

“They cite issues such as inadequate access to policy information, insufficient voting aids, and potential confusion over the proposed use of colour-coded ballot papers.” (Jan, Thaiger)

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Uzbekistan

In Data and Research:

The absence of questions on disability in the census.
(In Uzbek, Jan, Gazeta)

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Europe

Guidelines on Media Representation of Persons with Disabilities. (2025, ENIL)

In Policy and Rights:

Interview with MEP Ciaran Mullooly: “We need binding accessibility standards for all new public and private housing”. (2025, EDF)

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Croatia

People With Disabilities Star at Inclusive Fashion Show in Croatia. (2025, BalkanInsight)

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France

In France, Rehabilitation Produces a Watchmaker. “Cormac Hanley, a stroke survivor, created his 47Zero watch brand after training at the Òfil Osons l’Emploi horology program.” (2025, New York Times)

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Germany

“Accessibility is the key to an inclusive society”. Interview with Verena Bentele, president of the welfare association VdK. (2025)

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Malta

In Policy and Rights:

Thirty years on Malta’s disabled community faces the same obstacles. (2025, Newsbook)

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Norway

In Policy and Rights:

Norway Makes History. “With a clear majority, the Norwegian Parliament voted to incorporate the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) into the Human Rights Act.” (2025, ENIL)

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Serbia

Why Serbia is experiencing a decline in job opportunities for persons with disabilities. (2025, NIN)

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United Kingdom

Disabled people in England ‘betrayed’ by cuts to new-build accessibility targets. (2025, the Guardian)

Disability charity chief condemns UK government as she rejects MBE. Tressa Burke, chief executive of the Glasgow Disability Alliance:

‘turned down an MBE in the New Year Honours over what she described as the "simply intolerable" situation facing disabled people in the UK.’ (2025, BBC)

Sign language interpreters say job can be 'emotional whiplash'. (2025, BBC)

In Conflict and Peace:

Disability Charity Sacks Employee for Palestine Protest, Citing ‘Brand Reputation’. (2025, Novara Media)

Nnena Kalu becomes first artist with a learning disability to win Turner prize. “[Her win] begins to erase that border between the neurotypical and neurodiverse artist.” (2025, the Guardian)

Leatherhead disability group recreates Victorian hospital images. (2025, BBC)

In Digital Accessibility and Technology:

Scottish judge becomes first to use computer led voice tech in court after MND diagnosis. (2025, ITVx)

Whether the government likes it or not, the Special Needs debate is full of a familiar nastiness. (Jan, Maybe I'm Amazed)

Stigma, trust and the history of UK disability policy:

A better understanding of disability is key factor in improving inclusion, new BDF findings. (2025, Business Disability Forum)

In History and Memorial:

In memory of Graham Findlay. (Feb, Disability Wales)

“The UK state has a history of creating and amplifying disability stigma. Politicians have regularly stoked public fears of disabled people, through talk of shirkers and scroungers. Lower-level officials have casually and harmfully judged, ignored and discriminated against disabled people.” (2025, History & Policy)

Scottish judge becomes first to use computer led voice tech in court after MND diagnosis. (2025, ITVx)

‘You just feel so light!’: two wheelchair users – one 81, one 25 – on welfare cuts, housing and the joy of swimming. (2025, the Guardian)

In Mobility, Travel, Transport and Tourism:

What happened to the invalid carriage? Before the Motability scheme, disabled people were leased a tiny blue car. (2025, Body Babble)

The Politics of Parking “a 4-year research project which seeks to explore how disabled people's everyday ‘encounters’ with others contribute to experiences of oppression, particularly in the context of Blue Badge parking spaces.” For example:

“Two thirds (67%) of disabled people taking part in the survey had experienced hate and harassment in accessible parking spaces. People with chronic illness were particularly likely to report this type of encounter.” (2025, Vera Kubenz)

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North America

Canada

Disability advocates urge Toronto, province to plan ahead for winter accessibility challenges. (Jan, CBC)

How Universities Are Shutting Out Disabled Students and Staff: “Some administrators treat accommodations as a favour—and those requesting them as problems”. (Jan, The Walrus)

In Independent Living and Deinstitutionalization:

Extraordinary measures of sibling worldmaking. Ethnographic research involving disabled and non/disabled siblings:

“Sibling disability worldmaking is a co-creative process in which the siblings collaborate and work together to produce livable lives and habitable worlds for them both. Once parents are no longer primary supports, siblings rely on one another, navigating their roles and relationships in a shared effort to create a new sense of stability. This can happen gradually in fluid ways over time as roles shift, or it can happen in traumatic and jolting ways during times of crisis.” (2025, Medical Anthropology Quarterly)

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Cuba

In Relationships, Sex and Reproductive Rights:

A full life for people with disabilities. Reflection on education and, El derecho de soñar, a soap-opera featuring two people with intellectual disabilities in a relationship. (In Spanish, 2025, CubaHora)

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Honduras

People with disabilities voting in elections. (In Spanish, 2025, Tiempo)

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Mexico

New Guide Aims to Help Realize Potential of Key Legal Capacity Reform. (2025, Human Rights Watch)

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Trinidad and Tobago

Searching for silence: Tinnitus 1 - 0 Trinidad and Tobago. (Feb, Disability Debrief)

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United States

Snowstorms Are Hell for Wheelchair Users —But They Don’t Have to Be. (Feb, Mother Jones)

Disability Justice Organizers share where they find hope in the struggle for disability justice as we go into the second year of Trump 2.0. (Jan, Truthout)

The ‘R-Word’ Returns, Dismaying Those Who Fought to Oust It. (Jan, New York Times)

Bad Bunny’s Sign Language Interpreter Will Make Super Bowl History, Too: by interpreting in Puerto Rican Sign Language. (Feb, New York Times) See also an interview with the interpreter.

Trump administration says sign language services ‘intrude’ on Trump’s ability to control his image. (2025, AP News)

A Call Out to Disability Studies and Mad Studies Scholars:

Mattel launches its first autistic Barbie. (Jan, the Guardian)

In Data and Research:

“We become curriculum. We become words on the powerpoints, the lectures, the textbooks, but never fully acknowledged as whole human beings with fundamental needs. We’re studied, cited, discussed, and still unsupported.” (Jan, The Numbing Agenda)

Low-Income Disabled Youth Face Significant Challenges Upon Coming of Age. Many Lose Critical Income Support From Supplemental Security Income:

“More than 4 in 10 SSI youth lose their benefits when they turn 18 because they have not demonstrated that they meet SSI’s stringent adult definition of disability, even if they continue to have health conditions that limit their daily activities.” (2025, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities)

Born Deaf and Blind, She’s Caught in Trump’s Anti-Diversity Crusade: “A program for deafblind children helped 3-year-old Annie Garner, born with poor vision and no ears, learn to communicate.” (2025, New York Times)

The Atlantic’s ‘Accommodation Nation’ is an Ableist Abomination. (2025, Disabled Journalists Association)

More Harvard Undergrads Are Reporting Disabilities, Bringing Rate in Line With National Average:

“The rise — from roughly three percent in 2014 to 21 percent in 2024 — brings the share of undergraduate students receiving accommodations at Harvard in line with the national average, which has consistently hovered around 20 percent.” (2025, Harvard Crimson)

No, Colleges Do Not “Over-Accommodate”. A certain genre of articles sceptical of higher ed’s disability accommodation process fuels attacks on civil rights. (2025, IHE)

The Problem With Palantir’s New Neurodivergent Fellowship:

“A ‘neurodivergent fellowship’ at a corporation like Palantir isn’t meaningful inclusion or representation so much as it’s an exercise in having an often punitively surveilled population be complicit in making platforms of weaponized surveillance, to build and be the systems and tools of their own and others’ oppression”. (2025, Mother Jones)

Mamdani Pledges More Inclusive Hiring for Disabled New Yorkers. (2025, AbleNews)

In History and Memorial:

Leslie Lee III, culture critic and Long COVID advocate, dies at 43. (2025, The Sick Times)

Major Victories in Advancing Disability Justice in Massachusetts. “Disabled leaders and our allies force passage of sweeping government transparency bill to confront the tragic untold history of state violence against disabled children and adults.” (2025, (Un)Hidden)

'Don't mourn, organize.' How disability rights advocate Bob Kafka helped shape Austin and the nation. (2025, KUT News)

Crip Screens: Countering Psychiatric Media Technologies:

‘Banner shows how institutions use documentary films, data visualization, network graphs, therapy chatbots, virtual patient training programs, and pharmaceutical advertising to pathologize certain people as “deviant” and “mentally ill.” Those people so categorized have used media technologies toward alternative visions of care. Examining insurgent media and technology efforts in the 1960s and 1970s, Banner shows how women and communities of color worked to wrest away from psychiatry its hold over representing mental distress and pathological categorization.’ (2025, MNG Bookshop)

In Independent Living and Deinstitutionalization:

Recent Changes to Immigration Policies Have Disastrous Impacts on Disabled People and Long-Term Care. (Jan, AAPD)

Broken Care, Broken Lives:

“State agencies and organizations charged with protecting people with intellectual and developmental disabilities are repeatedly failing residents, putting them at risk of abuse, neglect, and even death.” (2025, Grace Dow Writes)

I’m autistic and have a brain injury. ICE dragged me from my car anyway. Then my nightmare really began. (Feb, Independent)

The Danger ICE Poses to the Disabled Community. (Jan, Non-Profit Quarterly)

Woman dragged from car by ICE identified as U.S. citizen Aliya Rahman: "I'm disabled trying to go to the doctor up there, that's why I didn't move". (Jan, CBC)

A Texas man detained by ICE was his disabled son’s sole caregiver. His son will be laid to rest without him:

“At first, they hoped Maher could be released to provide the 24-hour specialized care for Wael that only he was trained to do. But in Wael’s last days, they were holding hope Maher could at least say goodbye to his son in person.” (Jan, CNN)

AAPD Resources and News Sources Amidst ICE Violence. (Jan, AAPD)

Democracy Denied for Disabled Americans: Guardianship and the Right To Vote:

“In many states, people under guardianship are automatically barred from voting or may lose their rights at the discretion of a judge or guardian.” (2025, CAP)

Autistic Barbie Doesn’t Represent Me. She Shouldn’t Have to. (Jan, Time)

A Take on Disability Pride from LAMN Board Chair, Tye Martin:

“Disability pride is choosing to be present in a body that often demands more than it gives. It is continuing even when nothing about the moment feels empowering. Disability pride looks like waking up and seeing what the next day brings without expectations. The tide will turn and eventually the season will change again.” (2025, LAMN)

In Mobility, Travel, Transport and Tourism:

His Job Is to Make the Subway Accessible. “Quemuel Arroyo, the New York transit system’s chief accessibility officer, has used a wheelchair for half his life. He understands how difficult it is to navigate the subway.” (2025, New York Times)

In Policy and Rights:

Texas and Eight Other States Renew Attack on Section 504 and the Right of Disabled People to Live in their Communities. (Jan, DREDF)

Democracy Denied for Disabled Americans: Guardianship and the Right To Vote:

“In many states, people under guardianship are automatically barred from voting or may lose their rights at the discretion of a judge or guardian.” (2025, CAP)

In Sport and Paralympics:

Super Bowl has new accessibility measures for blind fans. (Feb, NPR)

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Oceania

Australia

In Policy and Rights:

Australian ALS Patient Denied Disability Support, Chooses Euthanasia. (Jan, National Review)

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New Zealand

Fear of language loss drives push to develop reo Māori signs for tāngata turi. (2025, Te Ao Māori News)

Digital NZSL library to boost access for Deaf New Zealanders. (2025, Security Brief)

Whaikaha, Whaimana: Our Voices Count: “Research by Disability Leadership Canterbury exposes the deep impact of the March 2024 disability system changes on 40,000 people and their whānau.” (Jan, Disability Leadership Canterbury)

In Independent Living and Deinstitutionalization:

Family carers win landmark Supreme Court case defining them as homeworkers:

“Caring for my daughter is the most important role I will ever have, but it also replaces services the Government would otherwise need to provide. This judgment makes it clear that when the Government relies on family carers to carry out this work it must also respect our rights as workers, with fair pay, proper protections, and dignity.” (2025, NZ Herald)

20-year-old man dies after staff miss major red flag his bowel had ruptured. “Care staff failed to recognise the severity of his condition or seek timely medical assistance”. (Jan, RNZ News)

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South America

Argentina

Milei's government announces the closure of the National Disability Agency: “While the Executive assures that benefits will not be cut, uncertainty reigns among the affected families”. (In Spanish, 2025, Últimas Noticias)

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Guyana