A new project on the improvement of young disabled people’s life in Ukraine has started

10.07.13, Ukraine
On June, 1 thanks to the financial support of Caritas Spain and Caritas France, Caritas Ukraine started a project “Social inclusion and development of integration centres for young disabled people in Ukraine”.    

The aim of the project is to contribute to social integration of youth with special needs into the society. This is a part of complex and many-sided work which Caritas carries out for the observance of rights and freedoms of people who found themselves in critical life circumstances.

The target group of the project consists of young people with mental and other disabilities aged 18 and over. The indirect users of the project and four Caritas Ukraine centres in Ivano-Frankivsk, Lviv, Stryy and Drohobych are also relatives or custodians of people with special needs, volunteers, students, local communities, project employees.

“People with disabilities form one of the most vulnerable groups in Ukraine and amount to 15% of the total population in Ukraine according to the UN data. During the previous years the government of Ukraine adopted the UN Convention on the observance of rights of people with disabilities and signed the optional protocol to it, also at the current stage it tries to adapt an appropriate legislation for the protection of rights of people with disabilities.

Regardless of that the implementation of the law and the observance of rights of people with disabilities linger on a very low level and people with special needs face numerous barriers in their life and yet are excluded from various areas of social life”, – marks Liudmyla Sukhareva, the national coordinator of work with disabled people in Caritas Ukraine.

Thanks to the support of contributors from Spain and France starting from 2008 Caritas Ukraine provides services for young people with mental and other disabilities. Currently four centres of social rehabilitation for youth with special needs are visited by more than 100 people and about 20 of them are residents of geriatric home.

The project, which started in June, took aim at the expansion and improvement of work of the network of 4 centres, at the contribution towards the development of rehabilitation programs and programs on social integration; it envisages a chain of educational and informational events, particularly the collaboration with state institutions, educational and cultural institutions, local communities and other public organizations.

The implementation of the project “Social inclusion and development of integration centres for young disabled people in Ukraine” will contribute to the provision of day-to-day activity of Caritas centres, which are often the only place in small towns and their neighbourhoods where a package of social and psychological support is provided and programs of social rehabilitation for people with special needs are conducted.

“Afterwards, young people with mental disabilities will be able to improve vital skills, be more self-sufficient and independent, adapted to the living conditions, will be able to integrate more easily into society. Local residents will be more open to the problem of people with special needs, which in its turn will help to defeat the stigmatization and isolation”, – Liudmyla Sukhareva finishes the story about the initiate project with the knowledge of the achievements of Caritas previous years in this field.