Mirit Asher knows that she will not be able to take care of her daughter Tal in the event of a biological or chemical attack. Tal, 11, suffers from a severe developmental disability that is formally classified as a 100 percent disability by the National Insurance Institute. Asher knows she has no hope of strapping a gas mask onto her daughter's face.
About a month ago, Asher saw in the newspaper a photo of a gas mask specially fitted for people with respiratory problems. She turned immediately to the gas mask distribution depot closest to her Tel Aviv home. Soldiers at the depot told her to relay her request to Home Front Command headquarters. The mother received the appropriate forms, filled them out with the assistance of Tal's physician and then sent them back to the Home Front.
Since then, she has been unable to determine whether the forms made it to the right recipients, whether a medical committee has reviewed her daughter's case, or when she should receive a reply. After 20 telephone conversations she managed to squeeze out one unsatisfactory answer: Wait another month, she was told.
As a mother, and a member of the Tel Aviv-Jaffa executive board of the Akim association for people with developmental disabilities, Asher is not accustomed to the feeling of helplessness that was prompted by this gas-mask run around. Her frustration, unfortunately, is not uncommon. Some 20,000 Israelis with disabilities have yet to be outfitted with appropriate chemical or biological defense kits.
Some 25,000 people in Israel suffer from developmental disabilities of various degrees of severity. About 8,000 live in institutions; the remainder live with their parents. Apart from a minority who have only mild disabilities, members of this population are unable to wear gas masks.
The Home Front has been aware of this problem for years. The emergency civil defense guidelines released two years ago by the Home Front and the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs state in bold letters: "Do not strap gas masks on people with developmental disabilities, as they could endanger their lives." These guidelines, and other publications, reinforce the need to set up "protected spaces" for the developmentally disabled.
But despite recognition of the need to create such areas, it appears that only the facilities run by Akim have established rooms with special filter systems that can be turned on in the event of an emergency. About a month ago, the director of the Labor and Social Affairs Ministry's security department wrote that both the Home Front and his ministry are "aware of this difficult problem and are trying to find an optimal solution. The best solution appears to be collective defense systems that would allow people to stay in protected areas without the need to put on gas masks. But this solution cannot be implemented in every facility, for technical reasons."
A limited solution appears to be available for special needs youngsters who live with their parents. Children up to the age of eight, say Home Front officers, can use the same bardasim (hooded gas masks) used by their peers. The Home Front also believes that people whose disabilities are not severe can use specially adjusted gas masks. Yet Akim officials estimate that such solutions still leave 10,000 developmentally disabled persons without any form of civil defense.
The Home Front plans to supply a new type of civil defense kit, a kaisar, to this group of 10,000. The new equipment is essentially a bardas suited for adults. Yet it appears that an insufficient quantity of these articles have been manufactured to date. Furthermore, the Home Front is not distributing those kaisars that have been produced, nor is it providing instructions to worried parents and relatives of people with developmental disabilities.
Yaela Wertheim, whose 10-year-old son suffers from a severe developmental disability, says that she has tried for months to extract concrete instructions from the Home Front. Her efforts have been to no avail. She explains that parents of children who have no disabilities can put their youngsters in a car, or fly with them to safe areas in the event of war; a family that cares for a disabled youngster has far fewer options, she says. She also says that the authorities ought to consider providing sedatives for children who are likely respond in an extreme or violent fashion to an attack
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