Report
Synthesis of eight country reports
Highlights
This report is a regional synthesis of assessments of barriers and opportunities for children and adolescents with disabilities in Kenya, Lesotho, Madagascar, Mozambique, Rwanda, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe. The report highlights promising practices in laws and policies, service provision, availability of data and evidence, and changing attitudes and behaviors towards children with disabilities.
The report also includes findings on barriers children with disabilities face. The country assessments found that negative personal and social beliefs, behaviours and norms around disability persist across the region. All countries have laws and policies to address the needs of children with disabilities but there are gaps in implementation. Quality and disaggregated data on children with disabilities remains scarce and inconsistent across many sectors. This limits demand, and evidence-based policy, programming and advocacy. Also budget expenditure on services for children with disabilities remains low.
To address these gaps, the report provides recommendations for governments on how to meet the needs of children with disabilities.