KATHMANDU, FEBRUARY 18

The UNFPA Asia-Pacific Regional Office and the CBM Global Inclusion Advisory Group has released a report that underscores shortcomings in national capacities across the Asia-Pacific region to identify and support persons with disabilities. The report asks the question: "Are persons with disabilities included in the effort to leave no one behind?"

"It is estimated that one in seven people in the region have a disability," said Bjorn Andersson, the regional director for UNFPA in Asia and the Pacific, in a press release. "The findings of this report highlight the urgent need for governments across the region to invest in tools and policies that will ensure people with disabilities are not left behind."

The joint report with CBM Global lays out the disparity between the declared numbers of persons with disabilities and the accepted global estimate of 15 per cent, which is the figure determined when data is properly collected through standardised questions in censuses and prevalence surveys.

"When we see data of countries with extremely low prevalence of persons with disability - sometimes just 1 or 2 per cent - it's clear that the data gathering processes may not be inclusive," said José Viera, permanent representative of the Stakeholder Group of Persons with Disabilities.

"This report sheds light on the challenges in accurate data collection and presents a roadmap to rectify this systemic oversight and ongoing injustice."

The publication presents the findings from a survey of 17 countries, including Nepal, in the region. It examines the methodologies that governments use to understand the barrier that persons with disabilities encounter and makes recommendations to harmonise the questions using the accepted standard known as the Washington Group Questions.

The Washington Group Questions are used by more than 80 governments around the world and present specific phrasing to determine limitations in vision, hearing, mobility, cognitive function, self-care and verbal communication.

"The report shows us that we have a long way to go to make sure no one is left behind," Andersson said. "While there has been laudable progress in gathering more accurate data on disability in recent years, there are still people of vulnerable groups who are not counted.

This distorts the scale of the needs and leaves critical services underfunded."

A version of this article appears in the print on February 19, 2022, of The Himalayan Times.