The bankruptcy of the medical model of disability as a base for social policy is starkly exposed today in the work of Britain's Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecology.
Promoting discussion of the death of children with disabilities as medicine the College's report includes the statement, "A very disabled child can mean a disabled family" - a false sentence in that the definition of disability is a lack of function. Handicap is the condition experienced by the family and the child with the disability.
A disability - a medical condition - may or may not be cureable by medicine. A handicap - a soclal consequence of exclusion due to a medical condition - is a social practice that is "cureable" by non-medical means.
One such manifestation of non-lethal approaches to resolving handicaps is the application of Universal Design in various markets such as Visitability in housing and Inclusive Travel and Inclusive Destination Development in transport and leisure.
Britain's Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecology may succeed in fomenting the discussion on the topic of euthanasia. It is unfortunate that it has initiated the conversation with a vocabulary inadequate to the argument.
Readings on the Social Model of Disability:
International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF)
http://www.rollingrains.com/archives/000513.html
Implementing the Social Model of Disability
http://www.birmingham.gov.uk/GenerateContent?CONTENT_ITEM_ID=1196&CONTENT_ITEM_TYPE=0&MENU_ID=1815
Manchester City Council: The Social Model of Disability
http://www.manchester.gov.uk/disability/policies/model.htm
The Social Model of Disability
http://inclusion.uwe.ac.uk/inclusionweek/articles/socmod.htm
The Social Model of Disability Explained
http://www.southamptoncil.co.uk/social_model.htm
Disability Issues: the Social Model
http://www.equality.salford.ac.uk/disability/social_model.php
Canada: Defining Disability
http://www.sdc.gc.ca/asp/gateway.asp?hr=/en/hip/odi/documents/Definitions/Definitions003.shtml&hs=oxf
Diary of a Goldfish
http://blobolobolob.blogspot.com/2006/04/social-model-of-disability.html