Background of the International Day of People with Disabilities

 

Around the globe people with
disabilities celebrate December 3rd;
© panthermedia.net/Rilo Naumann

The International Day for People with Disabilities is commemorated on December 3rd on an annual basis. It was established by the International Day for Disabled Persons. In 1976, the General Assembly proclaimed 1981 as the International Year of Disabled Persons (IYDP).

This year called for a plan of action to promote awareness of disability with an emphasis on equalization of opportunities at a local, national and international level throughout the world.

The theme of IYDP was "full participation and equality”. The purpose of this theme was to ensure that all people with disabilities have the right to live their lives independently on equal par as everybody else in the community in all aspects of political, social, cultural and economic aspects of life.

Other objectives of the Year included: Increase public awareness; Understanding and accepting people with a disability; and encouraging people with disabilities to come together to speak up and express their views and take action in order to improve their quality of life. This is known as Self Advocacy.

Due to the success of the IYDP, the United Nations adopted the IDPwD in 1982 with the purpose of further enhancing the rights of people with disabilities throughout the world. This is an important day every year for all people with disabilities and their families as it provides a great opportunity to promote public awareness.

The IDPwD has a specific theme every year in order to have a clear focus as to what the issues people wish to highlight in their communities. Some of those include the following. As we can see the above themes cover a wide range of areas. However, the theme for this year’s special day is “Keeping the promise: Mainstreaming disability in the Millenium Development Goals towards 2015 and beyond.” The purpose of this theme is to remind policy makers around the world to ensure that people with disabilities are included in further enhancing the MDGs towards 2015 and beyond.

REHACARE.de; Source: European Network on Independent Living (ENIL)

- More about the European Network on Independent Living (ENIL) at: www.enil.eu

( Source: REHACARE.de )

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