Healthcare

The British treasury will this week will meet a delegation representing a dozen different charity organizations who are seeking an additional two hundred million pounds (2.5 billion Euros) to fund services for adults affected by various learning disabilities including Down’s syndrome.

The group of charities have aligned themselves together under the banner of The Learning Disability Coalition. By combining resources they have been able to compile compelling data to support their claims.
Statistics they will present to treasury create an image of already bad conditions being made worse by cuts emanating from the current economic crisis.
Generally the responsibility for social care for those severely affected by down syndrom and other learning disabilities falls on local authorities. Budget cuts have led to a 34% reduction in vital daytime services for sufferers as well as a more general erosion of social care facilities.
Figures gathered from education censuses show that current numbers of children affected by learning disorders will generate a growth in adult sufferers of between three and five percent annually until 2014.
The coalition sees this merging of growing needs and decreasing funding and service provision as a clear path to a major healthcare crisis.
Recent reports from health ombudsmen, an official impartial watchdog group, have directed heavy criticism at the NHS for ignoring the needs of people with learning disabilities to the point of neglect.
Treasury officials have announced that a modified plan to ensure adequate and sustainable funding for social care will be announced later in the year.
The coalition responds by suggesting that learning disabilities are not a priority for government, citing the gap between the changes in NHS funding, up by 4%, and social care funding being reduced by 1%.
Currently only about 137,000 out of 800,000 adults with learning disabilities benefit from care services, the group considers this to be a massive shortfall that must be addressed.

_________________________________
A coalition of 12 charity groups representing adults with learning disabilities are to request an increase in care funding of 200 million pounds.
Adult sufferers of Down’s syndrome and other learning disabilities have suffered a 345 reduction in vital daytime care services provided by local authorities.