Over fifty million people in the world live with cerebral palsy. According to the definition, it is a group of neurological conditions that affect movement and body position, caused by damage or developmental disorder of the brain at an early age. The term “cerebral” refers to the brain, and “paralysis” to a movement control disorder.
Today, October 6, marks the World Cerebral Palsy Day. In contexts like Bosnia and Herzegovina, persons with disabilities are particularly stigmatized and such markings carry a special weight and call for awareness of the obstacles faced by persons living with cerebral palsy.
Director of the Alliance of Associations of Persons with Cerebral Palsy FBiH, Professor Emira Švraka emphasized on this occasion that raising awareness is the first step towards change, no matter how small or large that change is. “The more aware we are of a problem or collective challenge, the more successful we will be in solving it,” said Professor Švraka.
She also accentuated that, in anticipation of this celebration, the Alliance joined the initiative to remove VAT on aids for persons with disabilities:
“By abolishing VAT on medicines and medical devices, health insurance institutions, as well as citizens, would significantly relieve their financial burden. This would, among other things, contribute to the long-term sustainability of the health system and improve the quality of health care for citizens. Bosnia and Herzegovina is the only one in the region that has a single tax rate on all products, including medicines and medical aids. In Croatia and N. Macedonia, the tax rate on medicines is 5 percent, in Slovenia 9.5 percent, in Serbia 10 percent,” she explains.
In addition to projects related to social awareness and inclusion, the Alliance of Associations of Persons with Cerebral Palsy of the FBiH is also implementing a regional project within the Gender Budget Watchdog Network through which they are trying to build capacities for monitoring public spending from a gender perspective, but also from the perspective of inclusion of women with disabilities, especially when it comes to budget funds allocated to mitigate the consequences of climate change – a discourse from which they, as well as men with disabilities, are almost completely excluded. Professor Švraka further highlights: “The barriers are also significant: economic, informational and spatial. In the sense of spatial, they are architectural and organizations of persons with disabilities talk about them the most, while the most important are economic, because poverty creates a poor quality of life for families who have a child or an adult with cerebral palsy and other psychomotor and sensory difficulties. Gender-responsive budgeting is part of the solution to the economic barriers that further stratify this large population.”
International Cerebral Palsy Awareness Day is a reminder that inclusion begins with awareness but cannot stop there. True inclusion requires systemic change, and that requires equitable budgets.
Dr. Švraka concludes: “Governments, civil society, and citizens have a responsibility to seek answers to questions such as: do our budgets reflect the needs of persons with disabilities, do they take into account unpaid care work, and do they protect the most vulnerable from the risks caused by climate change? All human rights are deeply interconnected.”
