With Law 42-2000, the Dominican Republic adopted a standardized definition of disability it states that: "For the purposes of this law, disabilities will be assessed based on the latest Spanish version of the International Classification of Impairments, Disabilities and Handicaps adopted by the World Health Organization (WHO), or any such classification accepted by this International Organization. Once a disability is detected, a referral must be made to a specialized care center, where disability will be assessed as appropriate and the required intervention measures will be determined."6
In contrast, other concepts of disability within Dominican law focus primarily on impairments. For example, the "Rules for the Assessment and Rating of the Degree of Disability of Beneficiaries of the Dominican Pension System" define disability as "any restriction or lack resulting from an impairment of ability to perform an activity in a way or within the range considered normal for a human being, resulting in excess or impaired performance and behavior in a normal or routine activity. This may be temporary or permanent, reversible or irreversible, and progressive or regressive."7 These rules are used to classify levels of disability when a request for a pension due to accident or illness is made.
The rules also specify the meaning of other terms including: "handicap"
defined as "the physical or intellectual condition of an individual who has a disease
or weak health condition causing a loss of his or her ability to perform work by
50%"; and "statutory impairment," defined as "a disease or weakened physical
and/or mental condition, the characteristics of which serve as a basis to assess
the degree of handicap."8
There are no available statistics on the number of people with disabilities
in the Dominican Republic. The widely cited WHO estimate that an average
of 10% percent of the world's population consists of people with some kind of
disability is used as a reference. Based on that rate and using figures from the
latest Population and Housing Census, the number of people with some kind of
disability in the Dominican Republic is estimated to be 850,000.9
6. Law 42-2000.
7. Resolution 78-02, Normas para la Evaluación y Calificación del Grado de Discapacidad de los Afiliados al Sistema Dominicano de Pensiones [Rules for the Assessment and Rating of the Degree of Disability of Beneficiaries of the Dominican Pension System], adopted by the National Council on Social Security, 7 August 2003.
8. Ibid.
9. 7th Population and Housing Census.