Latest News On Disabilities

Latest KFF Health News Stories

California Lawmakers Preserve Aid to Older, Disabled Immigrants

KFF Health News Original

Lawmakers passed a budget that rejected Gov. Gavin Newsom’s proposal to save nearly $95 million by eliminating in-home support services for qualifying older, blind, and disabled immigrants lacking legal residency. Advocates say Newsom’s plan would have cost more in the long run. Newsom has not indicated whether he’ll veto.

Medicaid ‘Unwinding’ Decried as Biased Against Disabled People

KFF Health News Original

People with disabilities say they are abruptly losing their Medicaid home health benefits and are being advised incorrectly when they call state offices for more information. “Every day the anxiety builds,” one beneficiary told KFF Health News.

‘Breaking a Promise’: California Deficit Could Halt Raises for Disability Workers

KFF Health News Original

Families of children and adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities say Gov. Gavin Newsom is reneging on an expected pay increase for care workers. If the delay goes through, it could impede services and invite legal challenges from advocates.

En Colorado, reevalúan leyes formuladas para proteger a los menores

KFF Health News Original

Hay esfuerzos en Colorado y otros estados para revertir las leyes que obligan a informar sobre sospechas de abuso o negligencia, argumentando que el resultado ha sido demasiados informes infundados, que perjudican desproporcionadamente a las familias que son pobres, negras, indígenas o tienen miembros con discapacidades.

California Fails to Adequately Help Blind and Deaf Prisoners, US Judge Rules

KFF Health News Original

Thirty years after prisoners with disabilities sued and 25 years after a federal court first ordered accommodations, a judge found that California prison and parole officials still are not doing enough to help deaf and blind prisoners — in part because they are not providing readily available technology such as video recordings and laptop computers.

Social Security Chief Testifies in Senate About Plans to Stop ‘Clawback Cruelty’

KFF Health News Original

Commissioner Martin O’Malley testifies to two Senate panels that his agency will stop the “injustices” of suspending people’s monthly benefits to recover alleged overpayments. The burden will be on the Social Security Administration to prove the beneficiary was to blame.

Exclusive: Social Security Chief Vows to Fix ‘Cruel-Hearted’ Overpayment Clawbacks

KFF Health News Original

New Social Security Commissioner Martin O’Malley is promising to change how the agency reclaims billions of dollars it wrongly pays to beneficiaries, saying the existing process is “cruel-hearted and mindless.”

Advocates Say a Practice Harms Disabled Children, Yet Congressional Action Is Stalled

KFF Health News Original

In the photos, a 9-year-old boy with autism appears barricaded between cubbies and furniture stacked near the walls of a North Carolina classroom. His mother, Erin McGrail, said her son was physically restrained at least 14 times while in third grade at Morrisville Elementary School. She said she learned details of his seclusion only after […]

In Los Angeles, Occupational Therapists Tapped to Help Homeless Stay Housed

KFF Health News Original

Los Angeles County is deploying a small team of occupational therapists to help newly housed individuals adjust to life indoors. Therapists are trained to recognize disabilities and help with basic living skills, such as hygiene and cleanliness, that can help prevent clients from getting evicted or slipping back onto the streets.

‘I Am Just Waiting to Die’: Social Security Clawbacks Drive Some Into Homelessness

KFF Health News Original

The Social Security Administration is reclaiming billions of dollars in alleged overpayments from some of the nation’s poorest and most vulnerable, leaving some people homeless or struggling to stay in housing, beneficiaries and advocates say.

Social Security Chief Apologizes to Congress for Misleading Testimony on Overpayments

KFF Health News Original

Acting Commissioner Kilolo Kijakazi sent the letter days after KFF Health News and Cox Media Group reported that the agency has been demanding money back from more than twice as many people as she’d disclosed in October testimony.

Social Security Clawbacks Hit a Million More People Than Agency Chief Told Congress

KFF Health News Original

More than 2 million people a year have been sent notices that Social Security overpaid them and demanding they repay the money. That’s twice as many as the head of Social Security disclosed at a congressional hearing in October.