What do we know about disability among Indigenous people?

What is disability?

Disability may affect how a person moves around and looks after themselves, how they learn, or how they communicate [1][2]. There are a lot of different kinds of disability:

• some affect the body, others affect how the brain works
• some are temporary, others last for a person's whole life
• some people are born with a disability, some people become disabled as the result of an event (such as a car crash).

A disability that is severe and affects how a person is able to live their life is classified as a 'profound/severe core activity restriction' [3].

What is known about disability among Indigenous people?

In 2008, one-half of Indigenous adults had some form of disability [3]. Around one-in-twelve Indigenous adults had a profound/severe core activity restriction.

Disability becomes more common as people get older [4]. In 2008, disability, including profound/severe core restrictions, were more common for Indigenous adults than non-Indigenous adults in every age-group (Figure 6), and a higher proportion of Indigenous adults required assistance with a core activity from a younger age. Overall, Indigenous adults were more than twice as likely as non-Indigenous adults to have a profound/severe core restriction [3].

Figure 1. Proportions (%) of Indigenous and non-Indigenous people with a profound/severe core restriction, by age-group (years), Australia (non-remote areas), 2008

Source: Steering Committee for the Review of Government Service Provision, 2011 [4]

References

1. World Health Organization (2002) Towards a common language for functioning, disability and health: ICF, the international classification of functioning, disability and health. Geneva: World Health Organization
2. Australian Bureau of Statistics (2010) Disability, ageing and carers, Australia: summary of findings, 2009. Canberra: Australian Bureau of Statistics
3. Australian Bureau of Statistics (2010) The health and welfare of Australia's Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, Oct 2010. Canberra: Australian Bureau of Statistics
4. Steering Committee for the Review of Government Service Provision (2011) Overcoming Indigenous disadvantage: key indicators 2011. Canberra: Productivity Commission, Australia