daily life, and which can be caused or aggravated by the economic and social environment."⁴ Executive Order 1660 allows that "[Disability] is any restriction in participation and relationship to the social environment or any limitation in the performance of daily life activities as a result of an impairment affecting a body structure or the mobility, sensory, cognitive or mental function."⁵ Although the focus on impairment versus activity restriction varies somewhat between the definitions, they all posit the same basic model of disability.

During the development of recent disability policy, Colombia has used definitions of disability more in line with those provided by the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF/ICIDH-2), where 'disability' is a multi-dimensional phenomenon resulting from the interaction of human beings with their physical and social environment. This policy differentiates the concept of "persons with disabilities" from that of the "disability situation."

Disability Situation: A set of environmental, physical, biological, and social conditions that may affect the autonomy and participation of the individual, family, community, and general population at any given time of the life cycle, as a result of the interactions of the individual with the environment.

Person with Disabilities: A person with disabilities is any person who experiences limitations to the performance of daily life activities and restrictions to social participation due to a health condition or to physical, environmental, cultural, and societal barriers.⁶

The Presidential Advisory Council for Special Programs, which helped adopt these definitions, has provided technical advise to the National Congress on the amendment of the Disability Act. The resultant Bill 173 of 2004 updates the disability policy framework to correspond to the new model of disability.⁷

Disability Population

No accurate or current information is available regarding the disability population. The only survey through which the National Statistics Department (DANE) has collected data on people with disabilities was the 1993 Housing and Population Census. The survey instrument included only one question intended to identify the disability population.

^4. Law 762, 31 July 2002. This law ratifies the OAS Inter-American Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Persons with Disabilities.

^5. Ministry of Transportation, Executive Order 1660, 16 June 2003.

^6. Bill 173, January 2004, modifies Law 361 of 1997.

7. Ibid.