Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1315450
3 LETTERS & EDITORIAL maltatoday | SUNDAY • 6 DECEMBER 2020 Mikiel Galea Letters & Clarifications Essential services for disabled 3RD December is the international day for persons with disability. UNESCO's theme for this year is "Building back better: towards an inclusive, accessible and sustainable post COVID-19 world by, for and with persons with disabil- ity". It will be focusing on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on people with disability and on the immediate response and crisis through open, inclusive and innovative use of digital solutions, tools and resources. The Malta Federation of Organisa- tions Persons with Disability (MFOPD) strongly believes in this theme, so much so, that its recent and various tackling of such issues, also through the media, say it all. It is of utmost importance that services required by persons with disability are considered as essential services so as never to stop these services for whatever reason as has happened, due to COVID-19: • Flexible and safe mechanisms should be put in place to author- ise disabled people to be able to leave their homes during man- datory quarantines, for short periods and in a safe way, when they experience acute difficulty with home confinement. • Students with disability should receive a good quality education which caters for their 'full devel- opment of the whole personality including the ability to work'. • The Maltese Government should invest and put in place the measures and tools with which persons with disability can live a dignifying independ- ent life. • Personal Assistance is put in place and accessible to all per- sons with an impairment who need it without any further delay It is imperative that persons with disability, through their organisations, have a voice. The voice of persons with disability must be in the centre of all conversations and policy making deci- sions at all times. The United Nation Convention for the Rights of Persons with Disability (UNCRPD) should be implemented at all times for the full benefit of all persons with disability in the Maltese islands. When we secure the rights of per- sons with disability, we move our world closer to upholding the core values and principle of the United Nations Charter and the Convention on the Rights Marthese Mugliette President, MFOPD Myopic zeal on abortion I too have something to say about nice words. They can never hide heinous crimes. In another paper, in reply to Dr Barbara, I have written that I leave the technical and medical aspects in the hands of the experts to debate. Here it goes: lethal experiments are performed on foetuses yet these frag- ile creatures are indisputably human. Their vulnerability should rather be a call for greater care than for anni- hilation (European Molecular Biol- ogy Organisation). All stakeholders must step forward to convince that it is both inhuman and self-defeating to terminate the unborn (Prof Jean Pierre Fava). Isn't this the same message in mentioned letter but in other words? The dilemma of unwanted pregnancy should not be met by abortion but by an unfailing determination to respect, protect, love, and serve life – every human life, at every stage and in every situation. This is when and where compassion comes in. The rationale displayed by Prof. Isabel Stabile defies logic. How doesn't she realise that converting the womb into a death chamber is a degrading and murderous operation and highly condemnable? I ask, has she a compassionate and humane bone in her body? Her my- opic zeal to crush human life is be- yond belief. John Azzopardi Zabbar