Disabilities funding must be priority

The proportion of overall heath spending on people with disabilities has dropped, which means that they are being asked to bear an unequal share of the effective health cuts.

Services are being denied to one of the segments of society that requires them most but is least able to highlight its own needs.

The World Health Organisation estimates that 10% of people have disabilities, which means there are about 400,000 such people in Ireland. The first step in dealing with any problem is to identify it, but the authorities have not made proper efforts to identify those with disabilities here.