Press Releases: 1993 Releases

Health Care Reform Must Meet the Promise of the ADA for Americans with Disabilities

Washington, D.C., September 23, 1993—As Americans across the country react to the Clinton Administration's new health care reform plan, United Cerebral Palsy Associations leaders throughout the country are calling for a grass roots awareness campaign to ensure that the proposed health care plan meets the needs of Americans with disabilities, fulfilling the promise inherent in the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). This is the landmark 1990 civil rights law for Americans with disabilities prohibiting discrimination in access to public accommodations, employment, transportation and communication.

"People with disabilities are a microcosm of America's health care needs," said John D. Kemp, executive director of United Cerebral Palsy Associations (UCPA) based in Washington, D.C. "If the new health care plan will work for us, it will work for all Americans." Kemp was born without arms and legs and uses prostheses. He has long fought a personal and professional battle for inclusion of people with disabilities in education, access to public accommodations, employment and health care.

UCPA leaders in the Association's 155 affiliates across the country agree that the Clinton health care plan is an enormous step in the right direction and endorse the plan's universal access, increased options for long term care, and elimination of exclusions for pre existing conditions -all of which are new benefits for people with disabilities and are consistent with the promise of ADA.

Along with their endorsements, however, UCPA leaders call for the plan to address some of the unique needs and vulnerabilities of Americans with disabilities and their families, including:

• preventive services that maintain wellness and increase the functional abilities of individuals with disabilities
• not limiting outpatient rehabilitation services, therapies and technologies only to those that restore functional ability but also allowing those therapies and technologies that assist in improving ability and overall health
• outpatient rehabilitation services that treat conditions occurring at birth or through aging, not limited to the effects of illnesses or injuries
• a guarantee that ADA protections apply to the National Health Board, regional and corporate alliances, and insurance plans

American families with members who have disabilities are potentially every American family that may at some time be affected by illness, accident, birth, and aging. The vulnerabilities and concerns of these families are universal.

'The Clinton Health Care Plan is going to help a lot of people; the plan has many strengths," said Kemp. "Our national health care plan ultimately needs to embody the health care needs of all Americans. As an organization providing advocacy and services for people with disabilities and their families, we at UCPA are an excellent test of what constitutes comprehensive health care. If the plan can address the vulnerabilities of people with disabilities, then we know that all citizens' vulnerabilities will be accommodated.*

Kemp called on UCPA leaders across the country to organize a public education campaign on what it will take to create the best health care system in the world by the year 2000.” "Health care is the civil rights issue of this decade," said Kemp. The ADA helped Americans focus on equal rights and inclusion for the country's 43 million citizens with disabilities. The question of health care calls us to re-examine and re-define what citizenship means for all of us. Being a citizen of the most powerful and wealthiest country in the world has got to mean having access to the best health care possible."

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