More than 200,000 disabled people in southwestern China's Yunnan Province have been well treated with help from the community since 1998, according to the ongoing fourth session of Yunnan Disabled Persons' Federation.
The province, with a large area of poverty and backward medicalcare, has over 2.6 million disabled people.
Since the Five Year Plan on Disabled People was instituted in 1998, more than 200,000 invalids have been helped, including 80,000 cataract patients, about 3,520 deaf people, 30,000 mental patients and another 26,000 people suffering from various problems,including poliomyelitis.
Thanks to the local government's efforts, disabled people enjoyed better educational conditions, and the enrollment rate of disabled children rose from 47 percent to 77.8 percent over the past five years.
Some 25 special schools, containing 17,558 students, have been established and 375 passed the entrance examination for colleges. Labor and employment institutions have been specially set up for the disabled, arranging employment for 56,000.
Special loans for rehabilitation and alleviation of poverty have been allocated totaling 77.75 million yuan (9.37 million US dollars), lifting 590,000 disabled out of poverty and sheltering 37,800.
The improvement of conditions on health, study and employment also drove the development of recreation and sports for the disabled.
(People's Daily June 30, 2003)
