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Bedour Al Reqbanl and(below) Fahed bin AIS halkhat the Abilitles ME Preliminary Meeting on Sunday. http://www.khaleejtimes.com/nation/inside.asp?xfile=/data/nationhealth/2013/April/nationhealth_April7.xml§ion=nationhealth Attracting more centres and qualified therapists for people with disabilities was one of the many challenges and gaps identified at the first meeting of its kind to discuss the rights of people with disabilities in the UAE. With World Autism Day falling today, the AbilitiesME Preliminary Meeting on Sunday was a timely event which brought together representatives from the UAE health authorities and Ministries of Interior and Social Affairs. The focus was to review UAE regulations and implementation of the UAE Disability Law 2006, and recommend a new agenda for the education, health, accessibility and employment of disabled and special needs communities. Director of the Social Inclusion and Cohesion Department at the Community Development Authority Dr Bushra Al Mulla said a large part of the day was about looking at gaps in the system. Problems identified included large waiting lists for special needs centres, lack of centres for children with severe disabilities, and a lack of policy to safeguard people’s rights to receive rehabilitation services. While some parents could afford to take their children to private services, those who couldn’t had to put up with “adhoc services here and there”, with a large number of people having zero access to services, she said. The cost of treating a child with autism at age 10, if he did not receive early intervention at age five, would double, so the financial impact and burden on families, society and government was huge, she said. There were also not enough specialists here to help diagnose or treat conditions. While UAE students could do a bachelor of special needs or physiotherapy, the UAE did not offer any degrees in specialist areas, meaning these had to be done abroad, she said. Director of Kalimati Speech and Communication Centre Bedour Al Raqbani agreed there was a lack of qualified personnel at special needs centres. More regulations and consistent accreditation for therapists was needed, as current standards and quality really differed, she said. Meanwhile, there were “still alarming numbers of children on the waiting list of different public and private centres,” and parents had no option but to wait to get their children in. “Early intervention is the most sought-after therapy in the world. Not being able to assess and assist in the early and critical stages is terrible. The severity of the special need will (get worse) with time.” Autism Trust Foundation founder Fahed bin Al Shaikh said there were no federal autism centres, and the Ministry of Social Affairs needed to take more responsibility for this — and provide more consistent rules and regulations around licensing centres and therapists. Meeting organiser Prudence Kolong said this was the first time a meeting had been held to focus on how to best implement law 29 to reflect current trends. One such trend was how to integrate the new types of disabilities such as autism. “Autism has been around for some time but has gained momentum recently. Ten years ago in the UAE, parents wouldn’t know which doctor to go to … it’s still not perfect but the information is getting out there,” she said. Statistics and accurate data about the number of people with disabilities in the UAE was also still a major gap, Kolong said. sarah@khaleejtimes.com