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This report presents the findings of Disability Rights International (DRI)'s two-year investigation into the treatment of children and adults with mental disabilities in Mexico City which found a pattern of egregious and widespread human rights violations. The investigation found that in Mexico City having a disability can mean a life of detention and uncovered the existence of a “blacklist” of particularly abusive institutions that the Mexico City authorities are aware of – yet they permit these facilities to operate. DRI visited five of 25 facilities on the blacklist and specifically highlight the findings from Mama Rosa and Casa Esperanza, which was so abusive that DRI filed a formal complaint to DIF and sought immediate action by DIF to protect detainees. The report outlines the overall findings and how Mexico can take steps toward reform and justice calling for immediate steps to enforce the basic human rights of people with disabilities and outlines

Note: the report is available in pdf and word versions in both English and Spanish

Introduction: Humanitarian crises continue to pose a significant threat to health; the United Nations estimates that 144 million people are directly affected by conflict or environmental disasters. During most humanitarian crises, surgical and rehabilitative interventions remain a priority.

Objectives: This review assessed the quality of evidence that informs injury and physical rehabilitation interventions in humanitarian crises.

Methods: Peer-reviewed and grey literature sources were assessed in a systematic manner. Selected papers were evaluated using quality criteria based on a modified version of the STROBE protocol.

Results: 46 papers met the inclusion criteria. 63 % of the papers referred to situations of armed conflict, of which the Yugoslav Wars were the most studied crisis context. 59 % of the studies were published since the year 2000. However, only two studies were considered of a high quality.

Conclusions: While there is now a greater emphasis on research in this sector, the volume of evidence remains inadequate given the growing number of humanitarian programmes worldwide. Further research is needed to ensure a greater breadth and depth of understanding of the most appropriate interventions in different settings.

International Journal of Public Health, Vol 60

This publication is a collection of essays from Equality and Diversity Forum and EDF Research Network Beyond 2015 project. It presents a collection of articles about three main concepts: equality, human rights and social justice in the United Kingdom. The collection principally serves to describe levers for change and scenarios where equality and human rights could be promoted

This is the third Technical Report in a three part series for the two year DFAT Australian Aid funded project (2013-2015), Promoting the Inclusion of People with Disabilities in Disaster Management in Indonesia. This report details the development, refinement and field–testing of the Disability Inclusive Disaster Resilience (DiDR) tool. The purpose of the DiDR tool is to identify the resilience and capabilities of people with disabilities to natural disasters in their family and community setting. The tool is designed to be used by people with disabilities, their families or carers and thereby to promote the inclusion of people with disabilities in Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) policy making and strategy implementation. The tool assesses the resilience of people with disabilities by bringing together four components known to be fundamental to disaster risk reduction: the individual’s functioning status, their level of participation in their communities, the physical vulnerability of their place of residence, and individual risk predictors known to influence the behaviour of the general population before, during and after a natural hazard emergency. In February and March 2015, the survey teams administered the DiDR Tool by interviewing 289 people with disabilities or their carers in four Indonesian Districts affected by diverse natural hazards 

Background: Childhood anxiety presents a serious mental health problem, and it is one of the most common forms of psychological distress reported by youth worldwide. The prevalence of anxiety symptoms amongst South African youth is reported to be significantly higher than in other parts of the world. These high prevalence rates become even more significant when viewed in terms of children with visual impairments, as it is suggested that children with physical disabilities may be more prone, than their non-disabled peers, for the development of psychological difficulties. 

Objectives: The main aim of this study is to develop, implement and evaluate a specifically tailored anxiety intervention programme for use with South African children with visual impairments.

Method: A specifically tailored cognitive-behavioural therapy-based anxiety intervention, for 9–13 year old South African children with visual impairments, will be evaluated in two special schools. The study will employ a randomised wait-list control group design with pre- postand follow-up intervention measures, with two groups each receiving a 10 session anxiety intervention programme. The main outcome measure relates to the participants’ symptoms of anxiety as indicated on the Revised Child Anxiety and Depression Scale.

Conclusion: If the anxiety intervention programme is found to be effective in reducing symptoms of anxiety, this universal intervention will lay down the foundation upon which future contextually sensitive (South African) anxiety intervention programmes can be built.

A guide on the processes involved in implementing and designing instruments to measure the impact evaluation of development projects for commissioners and managers. This guide takes a multifaceted approach, considers the perspective of all possible stakeholders, and highlights best practice

This article contains an interview with Mulder Mkutumula, Mitigation Officer at the Department of Disaster Management Affairs in Malawi. Mr. Mkutumula discusses the importance of raising awareness and understanding of disaster risk reduction in Malawi, especially in the context of the 2015 floods

Purpose: To report the development of user-defined, multidimensional, psychometrically sound Quality of Life questionnaires – Impact of Hearing Loss on Children – IHL-C 69 and Brief IHL-C for children with hearing loss, in two languages -Tamil and English.

Methods: 421 problem statements from previous qualitative studies were reduced to a 220-item questionnaire with 7 domains (educational implications, social integration, psycho-social well-being, speech, language and communication, family relationships, leisure time activities and general functioning). After field testing, the domain of leisure time activities was dropped, resulting in a 103-item self-administered questionnaire with 6 domains. This 103-item questionnaire was translated from Tamil to English, and self-administered by children with hearing loss (11-18 years of age) in Special schools (n=100) and Integrated schools (n=100), as well as by normal controls in Integrated schools (n=200). Standard methods were used for item reduction and to evaluate psychometric properties.

Results: Psychometric item reduction produced the 69-item IHL-C69 (long version) and 48- item Brief IHL-C (brief version) questionnaires. Psychometric evaluation showed that all the domains of both the questionnaires had good acceptability, high internal consistency (alpha >0.80; intrinsic validity >0.80) and test-retest reliability (0.86).The questionnaires significantly distinguished between the children with hearing loss and the normal controls. The domains of both the questionnaires showed moderate evidence of convergent validity, and discriminant validity derived through hypotheses testing showed mixed results. The translation validity was also determined.

Conclusion: The IHL-C 69 and Brief IHL-C are reliable and valid user-defined, multidimensional questionnaires, available for the first time in both Tamil and English languagesin Tamil Nadu, India. Designed to analyse the impact of hearing loss and to determine the quality of life of children with hearing loss, the questionnaires could be used to prioritise the goals for rehabilitation intervention for these children.

This paper presents shared lessons from experts and organisations working on disability-inclusive poverty reduction in Bangladesh. It gives an overview of the situation of persons with disabilities in extreme poverty in Bangladesh, highlighting disability-specific challenges, and the gaps in institutional capacity to deal with these issues. Recommendations are provided on the need to identify persons with disabilities more clearly, introduce disability-focus to mainstream poverty reduction efforts, adopt measures to overcome disability specific challenges, and strengthen institutional capacity to work on disability issues