Carrol Cox wrote:
> The precise truth, that slaves (predominantly but not wholly black) were the
> subject of political political negotiations in which their interests simply did
> not appear, is more damning (and I think more illuminative of the "role"
> of disable people in contemporary politics) than the rhetorical embellishment.
> The ways in which different segments of the population become non-persons
> are on the whole more subtle than the vulgarities of a Jerry Lewis.
>
> Consider for example that most (all?) health plans offer only half-coverage
> for mental illness. The politics of this outrage are exceedingly complex --
> and would not quite be covered by saying Insurance Companies and
> Congress think the mentally ill are only half human. Actually, of course,
> neither the Insurance Companies nor Congress give shit about whether
> this or that group is half-human, inhuman, or wear beanies.
>
> Carrol
Ok I admit to being brainwashed and not re-educated about the history of the three fifths of a person matter.
Disabled interests do appear quite vividly in the development of the health care system though. They appear and get squashed because insurers and other powerful interests concerned more about costs of providing health care to persons in chronic (life long need) run counter to their desire to spend the money necessary (and eat into their profits) to accommodate the situation. Hence underwriting practices like cherry picking, setting caps, pre existing condition exclusion clauses, no mental health parity etc.
I did not mean to imply that the demeaning of disabled is the entire picture but rather to point out that when the medical establishment (and bioethicists) set up quality of life standards that assume quality of life can be quantified and that disabled rank at the bottom because of an impairment as in the WHO DALE example, it is easier to justify NOT making expenditures to impaired people because their lives are considered "less than" a non disabled persons. This is what happened in the original Medicaid rationing plan in Oregon. In order to provide coverage to all Oregonians, the Medicaid people determined that some disabled persons did not rate treatment. The disability right movement used the ADA to stop this discrimination.
There is a movement now to demand mental health parity, Carrol, maybe that is something you could get behind even though it will not solve all the problems.
Marta