The Ministry for Social Policy and Children’s Rights together with the Ministry for Inclusion and Volunteering, announced a new social measure that will be helping those with hidden disabilities and serious functionality problems, even though they do not does not have a disability referred to in the Social Security Act. These conditions include, among others, Fibromyalgia, ME and autism.
Through this measure, there will be a consolidation of the medical evaluation of persons with disabilities. To apply for disability assistance, the application is made online and the process is triggered directly by the person’s caring specialist, through their eID. In this way the medical documentation is immediately authenticated.
Eventually, these people will begin to appear before an inter-professional panel led by the Sapport Agency and the evaluation will be based on international standards on Health and Disability operated by the World Health Organization, the WHO. These boards will be set up after a public call was issued by Aġenzija Sapport for the professionals needed to assist in the board.
The most important development in all this is that people who do not have a disability mentioned in the Social Security Act, which often may not be visible but still causing suffering, will be assessed according to the International WHO Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF).
In this way, the lack of functionality of the person will begin to be better assessed by the professionals and eventually this will guide the Department of Social Security and the Support Agency on which benefits and services such persons they have a right to them and they can be given.
The Minister for Social Policy and Children’s Rights Michael Falzon stressed that this step will effectively help hundreds of people who until now had never benefited from benefits related to disability. “This Government fulfills what it promises, and more than that it comes in for those who need assistance or help. Our social soul will remain there because we believe in social justice with everyone. Nobody should be disadvantaged because of a disability or any kind of situation that could be an obstacle to that individual’s life,” stressed Minister Michael Falzon.
Minister for Inclusion and Volunteering Julia Farrugia Portelli explained how after a continuous dialogue they are making this reform so important and they are implementing this electoral measure whose aim is to create justice with those persons with disabilities who until now were not eligible for a financial benefit in order to alleviate the suffering they are experiencing on a daily basis.
“We kept our word with those who were bearing a significant burden in silence. Through the reform, the international classification of functioning will begin to be used, which is a tool of the World Health Organization in the way an applicant is assessed. This means that eligibility will no longer be restricted to the list contained in the Social Security law and thus Malta is now also aligning itself with the convention for the rights of persons with disabilities of the United Nations for the way in which disability services and benefits will begin to be assessed where a number of conditions that until today were not eligible for certain social benefits, including invisible conditions, will have the chance to become eligible. I look forward to the fact that together with the rest of the services offered by Aġenzija Sapport, this reform will give a crack of light for many people and their families,” concluded Minister Farrugia Portelli.
