Exploring How Disabled People Are Treated during Crises and Charting a Path Forward for a Justice-Based, Person-Centered Approach to Crisis Response

Abstract

We are living in a moment that is both trying and telling. As of this writing (Spring/Summer 2020), the novel Coronavirus continues to spread quickly across the world and in particular across the United States, where government refusal to act preemptively and years of underfunded investment in public health infrastructure have allowed the country to have both the most cases and the most deaths due to COVID-19 while also lagging behind leading countries in tests per capita. Preliminary data in the United States shows that the virus is having a larger impact on communities of color and low-income communities. Further, as hospitals and medical professionals reach tipping points in terms of capacity and medical supplies, they face difficult decisions around what protocols to set in place for rationing equipment, particularly ventilators. Generally speaking, protocols are geared toward saving the most lives most efficiently, which often leads to the prioritization of nondisabled and younger people over older and disabled people. A majority of the obstacles that disabled people face in their lives are due to social barriers, stigma, and other factors external to any impairments they may have. This in practice puts disabled people in a “Double Jeopardy,” because they are commonly marginalized and oppressed by society, they are deprioritized by that same society for life-saving medical care. This paper examines the history of disability during emergencies, making it clear that the problems that disabled and older people are facing in the midst of COVID-19 stem from preexisting disparities across different parts of life that are now proving to be fatal.