Disability rights are eroding under the Trump administration. Disabled people are in jeopardy of being forced back into institutions, particularly people with more severe physical, psychiatric, and cognitive disabilities. The Department of Justice issued a memo to states which reinterprets the Olmstead Act, which gave disabled people the right to leave institutions and reside in the community. While deinstitutionalization and independent living have become common since the 60s and 70s, Trump’s DOJ is attempting to reinterpret the Olmstead Act as a pretense to go back to institutionalization. Medicaid cuts and Trump’s resolve to cut Medicaid services, including personal care and home and community-based care services, are a precedent for Trump’s institutionalization.
Independent living is possible for severely disabled people with funding under Medicaid. It is less costly than institutionalization. People with severe disabilities are less likely to be segregated, isolated or neglected. Medicaid funding enables disabled persons to hire PCAs and reside in the community in their own homes.
This is a gross violation of civil rights for disabled people. Like Trump’s other policies, it is based on cruelty, and dehumanization, and on ugly rooted ableism and his disdain of disabled people.
Ableism is a type of bias that discriminates against, devalues, and dehumanizes people based on their perceived or actual disability status. Like racism, sexism, and other biases, they have been internalized for millennia. Ableism can be intentional or unintentional. The inherent problem is that disabled people are not seen as whole humans. Even disabled people themselves can hold this belief. It is difficult to feel whole when society views you as less than.
July 26 marked the 36th year anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990. The ADA prohibits discrimination and ensures equal opportunity for individuals with disabilities in all areas of public and private life. The current administration wants to abolish ADA mandates The ADA has flaws but has been instrumental in the inclusion of disabled people in society and most importantly has given disabled people civil rights. ADA mandates are not always followed and discrimination widely occurs. There is little enforcement in the ADA. Complaints from disabled people often need to be filed for resolution.
Ableism occurs in language, education, employment, healthcare, housing, religion, transportation, media, the prison system, and social interactions. In these institutions and systems, there are numerous failures to enable disabled people to access the same opportunities, rights, and treatment as non-disabled people. These attitudes and policies generate hurt, exclusion, loneliness, anger, sadness, and devaluation as a human. Disabled people are denied necessary accommodations in education, healthcare, employment, housing, transportation, and prisons.
Two dehumanizing and discriminating experiences I had recently, at two different medical centers really shocked me, one at a wound center, and one at a large urology practice. I cannot get on and off exam tables for necessary treatment due to my disability. I have a spinal cord injury, am paralyzed, and do not have ability to stand, walk, or transfer with a sliding board. The treatments I needed require access to the exam table. There are no lift policies in healthcare which is perfectly understandable as staff and patients need to be safe and without injury.
I asked both medical centers if they had a Hoyer lift so that I could have access and get treatment. Both did not. I asked staff how patients with physical disabilities who are unable to get on and off the exam table, receive treatment. I was told, “They come in a stretcher by ambulance or they go somewhere else.” These remarks were cold and had no compassion or even “I’m sorry.” These medical centers essentially said severely disabled people do not belong there. I intend to prove them otherwise.
I spoke to several administrators about the ADA, that medical centers are required to comply and provide accommodations including a Hoyer lift for patients who can’t access the exam table for treatment needed. Coming by stretcher or going somewhere else is inadequate. All administrators were unconcerned these accommodations do not comply. Their positions remained the same. Valley Medical Center in Easthampton understands and has stepped up to the plate and very soon will have a Hoyer lift so providers can examine and treat me and others. I applaud them.
People with disabilities have civil rights. The “Hoyer lift” is a metaphor, just one example. Ableism and discrimination need to be called out.
Cynthia Chamberland lives in Easthampton.