The Ministry of Health is responsible for developing measures to prevent the occurrence of
physical and mental disabilities, providing the necessary services to persons with disabilities, and
providing supportive measures (specialized rehabilitation services, insurance support, etc.) for
children of preschool age, the elderly and families in need.5 The Ministry of Health works with
the Welfare Organization, one of the main state institutions providing support and services to
persons with disabilities, to implement its measures and activities.6 Insufficient information is
available to assess the efficiency of potential plans, strategies and actions taken by the Ministry
of Health to implement its responsibilities.
The Welfare Organization issues a "disability card" for persons with disabilities. The process to
obtain a “disability card” is done online.7 However, there is no readily available information as
to the efficiency of such system nor disaggregated data on individuals being granted such
document.
The system in place for diagnosing disability has been reportedly inefficient in Iran. For
example, in February 2017, the deputy director of the Welfare Organization for Rehabilitation
stated that "The identification system in the Ministry of Health is disrupted, so that problems
have been created in this area for the Welfare Organization in terms of identifying disabilities.
For example, we know that 50% of spinal cord injuries occur due to car accidents, or we know
that many [cases of deafness] are congenital and have genetic causes; we have this information,
but there is no coherent information about the causes and prevalence of disabilities, because
access to this information requires close cooperation with the Ministry of Health and Welfare,
which unfortunately does not currently have the necessary cooperation."8
In light of the above, the process to diagnose disability in Iran is not efficient.
Recommendation Status:
This recommendation has been PARTIALLY implemented.
5
Behdash.gov, https://bit.ly/3exMTnu
http://en.behzisti.ir/
7
https://www.tabnak.ir/fa/news/888167/
8
https://www.isna.ir/news/95113021296/
6
2