The world is joining forces to break down the barriers
- Inés Hernández Gil
- Apr 1, 2019
- 3 min read
Updated: Apr 5, 2019
According to the World Report on disabilities, approximately, one billion people worldwide present some form of disability. This corresponds to the 15% of the entire population, but rates are in a constant increase since the current health conditions are getting worse. Those numbers are just evidence for saying that, disabled people constitute a minority group with high and difficult barriers in societies.
Facing the current problem
The sporty field is one of those matters in which inclusivity in not easy to achieve:
for years, countries governments, public and private associations, charities, foundations and other different initiatives have tried to end up with the psychological, logistical and physical barriers that separate sports and disabilities.
They are working hard on the issue, not only because of the evident existing gap, but because of the provable large benefits that sports can provoke among impairments.
Sports: a world full of benefits
It is well-known that sports can generate enormous advantages in people; not only in the physical area but also in the mental one. However, when it comes to problems such as disabilities, the amount of benefits can be duplicated.
Experts as Javier Roca (founder and director of Deporte sin Barreras) have always tried to reinforce that issue and promote the participation of people in the different existing disciplines. His personal experience with a sclerosis multiple person, make him put all his effort in providing a way for disabled people to get in touch with sports.
For him, it is not about inclusion but about giving facilities to those who do not have them. As he supports, many are the advantages that one can obtain thanks to sports and, everybody should have the possibility to experience it. Since its foundation, those values have been the ones leading his professional project: Deporte sin Barreras.
Moreover, what really makes disabled people believe in sports as a form of self-improvement, it is the words and experiences of those who had tried it:
She is a disabled surfer part of the Team England for adaptive surfing, who can not live without sports. She is one of the many examples that corroborates and expresses how crucial and positive can become being an active person.
“I love the feeling I get when I am taking part in sport"
Worldwide actions
Reality is that, sports associations and federations are the real important core in terms of integration and inclusion. They play a main role in providing structures, tools and facilities to all those disabilities’ sufferers. During the last decade, it has been registered a significant increase of these initiatives. As a consequence, it exists all around the world huge variety of sporty platforms with a common aim: help and give visibility to the disabled community.
Despite having a shared objective, it exists clear differences within the organizational framework of those worldwide actions. They can be either public or private, and depending on how they deal with the issue and how they internally work, it is distinguished between associations, federations or foundations and charities.
The Spanish example
Recently, Spain has been recognized as one of the European countries with more improvements towards the disabled situation. Although it is the US, the UK and Australia the ones that are at the top of this matter, thanks to arisen alternatives, activities and opportunities within Spain, the condition has highly improved.
These are just a few of the many actions that had arisen in Spain:
Taking a further step into the future
But, As Miguel Carballeda, the president of the Spanish Paralympic Committee, highlighted: it still much work to be done. He stresses in the necessity of a new legislation on Sports with greater implications and dedication to disability’s inclusion. As he said, it is required an innovative law as the situation has totally changed since the current law was proclaimed during the 90s.
“Todo el mundo coincide en que se ha quedado obsoleta y tiene que adaptarse a la nueva realidad del siglo XXI, que es muy distinta a la de los años 90”
What is seems clear is that, these days societies are looking more than ever through inclusivity and participation. Even though, it seems not enough as people continue talking about an existing gap between disabilities and sports. Moreover, it is true that, these worldwide concerns take lot of time to improve. The important thing is that there are some proper initiatives that are taking solutions to the main problems, and those are being more and more visible.
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