Families still lack stable support despite funding hike: advocacy group
Some 140,000 disabled school-age children have not received a full compulsory education, according to the China Disabled Persons' Federation, highlighting the challenges that China still faces in caring for disabled children.
There are 1.67 million disabled children under age 6 in China, and the number of disabled children increases by some 200,000 annually, Zhang Haidi, chairwoman of the China Disabled Persons' Federation, said at a news conference on Wednesday.
According to Zhang, since 2015, disabled students have been allowed to use auxiliary tools such as braille on the gaokao, the national college entrance examination, and 8,500 disabled students gained admission to college in 2015.
Zhang said such measures are far from enough, however, and stressed that China still lacks policies that can provide disabled children with sustainable and stable support, including a basic education.
Experts agreed that in spite of the government's provision of hefty funding for disabled children's care, the funds have not gone toward easing the economic burden on families, establishing disabled-friendly facilities and setting up more special schools for disabled children.
According to a Beijing auditing bureau, in 2011, three districts and counties in the capital used 1.99 million yuan ($298,011) in security funds for disabled people as daily-use funds and to cover business trip expenses, people.com reported.
Taking care of a disabled child is very costly and can sometimes impoverish a family, depriving students of the opportunity to go to school, Wan Daqiang, a Beijing-based lawyer specializing in child protection, told the Global Times.
Students' failure to receive compulsory education is often a result of their poor health, Wan said, calling for more funding to support physical therapy and more free health centers.
Under the 13th Five-Year Plan (2016-20) China plans to invest approximately 5 billion yuan to provide rehabilitation to disabled children, a program from which 400,000 children have benefited, said Zhang.
Some disabled kids also refuse to go to school for fear of being discriminated against, said Wan.
Zhou Xiaozheng, a professor of sociology at Renmin University of China, told the Global Times that discrimination against disabled students persists in some schools, even though it is forbidden by national law.
In 2013, Zhejiang Daily reported that a young boy who suffered extensive burns in an explosion was persuaded to stop attending classes by authorities at his school in Qingtian county, East China's Zhejiang Province, who said that his scars might scare others.
The Ministry of Education vowed to provide every disabled student with 12 years of free basic education during the 13th Five-Year Plan period, the Beijing Times reported in 2015.
