Introduction
Go Back A human rights approach to data is necessary to achieve human rights. For persons with disabilities, this requires (a) questions that identify persons with disabilities in censuses and household surveys; (b) that such questions are based on a functional approach to disability such as that adopted by the Washington Group on Disability Statistics, and; (c) that indicators of wellbeing can be disaggregated at the individual and household levels by disability (OHCHR 2021a).
The 2022 Disability Data Report (this Report) aims to inform the extent to which this human rights approach to data is in place through a review of national censuses and household surveys to identify those that include questions to identify persons with disabilities and, in particular, those that use a functional approach to disability (Section 3). Thus, this Report helps inform whether Article 31 of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) requiring States Parties to “collect appropriate information, including statistical and research data, to enable them to formulate and implement policies to give effect to the present Convention” is being implemented.
In addition, this Report adopts a human rights approach to data by providing a disaggregation of indicators in 35 countries using data on women from round 6 of the UNICEF Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS6) (Section 4). This helps determine whether equal rights have been respected for women with disabilities as per the CRPD. Additionally, it helps monitor the United Nations (UN) Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) adopted by Heads of States in 2015 as part of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development for women with disabilities. SDG 5’s focus is to end all forms of discrimination and violence against women and girls, ensure women’s participation and equal opportunities for leadership, and provide universal access to sexual and reproductive health and reproductive rights.
More than two decades after the landmark Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing, the global consensus on the need to achieve gender equality is strong (UN Women 2019). In that context, we need to determine if women with disabilities are disadvantaged within their economies and societies. This Report presents our findings on inequalities between women with and without functional difficulties in multiple areas: education, personal activities, health, standard of living, multidimensional poverty, insecurity, and subjective wellbeing (Sections 5 through 11). More background is included in the Method briefs (Appendix 3), and more results are available in Country briefs (Appendix 4) and Results Tables on the Disability Data Initiative (DDI) website.