According to a piece recently featured on the news site Philly.com, experts widely estimate that even when children with disabilities have medical insurance, their care costs their parents between $6,000 and $20,000 out-of-pocket annually. As a result, Supplemental Security Income (SSI) benefits can be extremely helpful for disabled children and their families. These governmental benefits that are available to certain disabled children can help to cover their out-of-pocket care-related expenses.
However, SSI benefits are not often enough to cover all necessary care-related costs for disabled children. And as valuable as the SSI program is, many caregivers, healthcare providers, and disability rights advocates are questioning whether the government should reform the program and others like it to better provide for disabled children.
Children are already a vulnerable population, even when they are able-bodied. It is difficult for children to advocate for their own needs and to ensure that they are met. Disabled children are often even more vulnerable, especially when they cannot adequately communicate what their needs are and whether they are being met. It is therefore imperative that responsible individual adults and large agencies ensure that disabled children have access to adequate medical care, medication, and treatment.
If your child is disabled and you have not yet applied for SSI benefits, please contact an experienced attorney in order to do so. In addition, please do not hesitate to contact your federal congressional representatives to tell them how you feel about whether or not the SSI system and others like it should be reformed in order to adequately provide for disabled children.