Celebrating Disability Pride Month

July is disability pride month, celebrating the landmark passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act in July 1990. This month honors the achievements and highlights the ongoing challenges faced by people with disabilities, including a history of challenges faced in healthcare and reproductive rights. About 13% of people in the United States have a disability, while about 27% of adults in the US live with some kind of disability.

When celebrating disability pride month, it’s also important to reflect on the history and recognize the barriers that people with disabilities still face today. Health and disability are closely linked.  According to CDC data from 2023, 1 in every 4 adults with a disability (ages 18-44) do not have a usual healthcare provider, and 1 in every 5 adults with a disability (ages 45-64) have not had a routine checkup in the last year. The CDC also states that persons with disabilities are “more likely to have poor overall health, less access to adequate health care, and an increased risk for preventable health problems.” These disparities arise because barriers prevent people with disabilities from accessing comprehensive and accessible healthcare resources, including sexual and reproductive health services. The WHO outlines common barriers faced when seeking disability-specific reproductive health resources as being; lack of physical access, insufficient information on how to treat people with disabilities, biases or ableism, absence of knowledge about disabilities, lack of coordination of disability and reproductive health resources, and insufficient funding.

Reproductive and disability rights are tied to human rights principles of bodily autonomy and self-determination. This means the right to make decisions about one’s own body, life, and future. People with disabilities historically have faced challenges to their reproductive autonomy in the United States.

Throughout US history, eugenics and ableism have influenced reproductive policies. Ableism is the discrimination experienced by individuals based on their perceived ability to function and produce in society, devaluing them because of specific physical, mental, intellectual, or developmental conditions. Eugenics refers to the scientifically inaccurate belief, historically rooted in racist or ableist ideologies, that some genetic traits are more desirable than others and may be achieved through selective reproduction.

The 1927 Buck v. Bell US Supreme Court decision supported these policies by upholding a sterilization law for individuals who were institutionalized and deemed ‘mentally feeble.” This eugenicist policy was replicated in more than 30 other states, leading to the forced sterilization of over 70,000 individuals, most of whom were Black women, based upon ableist, classist, or racially motivated reasons until 1970. Buck v. Bell has never been overturned, meaning that the decision still upholds the legality of forced sterilization, even though these policies have been widely denounced, and are rooted in ableist and racist ideologies. This is just one example of how people with disabilities have faced threats to their reproductive autonomy and self-determination.

The current disability justice movement centers on the overlapping experiences of people with disabilities, health inequities, and those experiencing other forms of discrimination on the basis of gender, race, and sexuality. It aims to achieve self-determination by understanding the multiple challenges to achieving autonomy. This movement began in the early 2000s, led by Patty Berne and Mia Mingus, two queer women of color with disabilities. They believed that the historic disability movement had failed them, and wanted to build a movement that took into account the different systems of discrimination they, and others, had faced. According to Sins Invalid, a disability justice organization based on exploring “themes of sexuality, embodiment and the disabled body,” to cultivate a culture of “beauty and sexuality inclusive of all bodies and communities,” disability justice frameworks focus on the individuality, strength, needs, and power of all bodies, and their innate connection to ability, race, gender, sexuality, class, nation-state, religion, and more.

Today, discussions focus on using this framework to address reproductive inequities faced by people with disabilities. Reproductive and disability justice frameworks overlap through their shared interest in bodily autonomy and self-determination. They aim to address injustices, build community support systems, and center marginalized communities and communities facing intersections of discrimination. Organizations like the Center for American Progress have outlined specific ways to achieve these goals, including;

Increasing access to comprehensive reproductive health care support and resources for people with disabilities

Addressing barriers that people with disabilities face when seeking reproductive health services by covering funding

Increasing the rights to reproductive autonomy in situations of legal guardianship; increasing reproductive health education and training for providers

Increasing sexual and reproductive health education for people with disabilities, who often do not receive the information they need about their bodies.

By embracing disability justice and reproductive justice, we can advocate for the autonomy and dignity of all individuals. Happy Disability Pride Month!