Policy brief on disability-inclusive health systems (2021)

Disability-inclusive health is an important issue. There are 135 million people with disabilities in Europe. People with disabilities, on average, have higher health-care needs than others yet face many barriers in accessing health services. As a result, people with disabilities have worse health outcomes on average, including 2–3 times higher mortality rates across all ages. Policies and laws to support the right to health care for people with disabilities are in place, but often they are not put into practice. The aims of this policy brief are to provide a practical and actionable source of information and set out an approach that can be used to engage ministries of health on disability-inclusive health.