Seite - 421 - in VULNERABLE - The Law, Policy and Ethics of COVID-19

421Not All in This Together: Disability Rights and COVID-19 risks during disasters.1 Their vulnerability is heightened when they live in congregate and communal and often forced living environ- ments, including large group homes, long-term care, jails, shelters, forensic hospitals, and psychiatric facilities. Women and racialized people with disabilities face greater marginalization at the best of times, including higher levels of poverty and unemployment. This economic marginalization is typically magnified during times of cri- sis. Violence against women rises during times of crisis and compul- sory isolation,2 particularly for women with disabilities.3 Only some persons with some kinds of disability-related needs are vulnerable to the virus itself, including if they are immune-com- promised, have respiratory conditions, or are prescribed antipsychotic medications associated with diabetes, a risk factor for COVID-19 com- plications. Many more persons with disabilities are vulnerable to other effects of COVID-19: poverty, barriers to access to employment and income supports, inaccessibility of information and communications about disaster planning, transportation barriers when COVID-19 test- ing sites encourage the use of private vehicles to reduce transmission, and inequality of access to health care and supports. COVID-19 lays bare society’s responsibility for the disablement of others.4 The social model of disability proposes that factors external to a person’s actual limitations determine that person’s ability to func- tion within society. A person may have no functional limitations other than those created by prejudice, stigma, and stereotype.5 A political response to addressing ableism may be formulated through the 1. United Nations, “Preventing Discrimination Against People with Disabilities in COVID-19 Response”, UN News (19 March 2020), online: <news.un.org/en/ story/2020/03/1059762>. 2. See Leilani Farha & Kaitlin Schwan, this volume, Chapter D-4. 3. Special Envoy of the Secretary-General on Disability and Accessibility, “Joint Statement Women and Girls with Disabilities and Older Women in Relation to the COVID-19 Pandemic” (28 April 2020), online (pdf): United Nations <www. un.org/development/desa/disabilities/wp-content/uploads/sites/15/2020/04/ covid19-joint-statement-women-girls-disabilities-olderwomen-covid19.pdf>. 4. Nancy Doyle, “We Have Been Disabled: How The Pandemic Has Proven The Social Model Of Disability”, Forbes (29 April 2020), online: <www.forbes.com/ sites/drnancydoyle/2020/04/29/we-have-been-disabled-how-the-pandemic-has- proven-the-social-model-of-disability/#40ec9ef72b1d>. 5. Ena Chadha, “The Social Phenomenon of Handicapping” in Elizabeth Sheehy, ed, Adding  Feminism  to  Law:  The  Contributions  of  Justice  Claire  L’Heureux-Dubé, (Toronto: Irwin Law, 2004) 209.