Originally published here.
The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic may have a greater impact on people with disabilities than non-disabled people. Our aim was to compare the short-term impact of the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic and first lockdown on the employment and financial security of working age adults with and without disabilities in the UK.
It is well established that people with disabilities are more likely than their non-disabled peers to be exposed to financial stressors such as income poverty, food poverty and insecure employment,1–9 stressors that are detrimental to health and wellbeing.
The 2020 global COVID-19 pandemic had a serious impact on the economies of many countries.13 Country responses to the pandemic have exposed flaws in social systems, revealing differential vulnerabilities among groups, and highlighting the extent to which different groups are marginalized in society. For example, research from population-based studies is beginning to suggest that the initial outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic has had a particularly detrimental impact on the psychological wellbeing of adults with disabilities.14,15
Much of the focus of disability-related research on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic to date has been on the direct health vulnerabilities for people with disabilities in relation to infection.16,17 However the effects (health and economic) related to the COVID-19 induced economic contraction are likely to be experienced well beyond the period related to the acute viral impact. To date, little is known about the immediate impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the employment and financial security of people with disabilities in the UK.18 Given that they are one of the population groups typically hardest hit by economic crises in general,19 the COVID-19 pandemic may compound employment exclusions and job loss for people with disabilities, particularly because they are more likely to be employed in the informal economy and often have work arrangements that bring fewer protections and entitlements compared to workers without disabilities.20 Therefore, it is plausible that the economic shock related to COVID-19 will have a greater impact on people with disabilities than non-disabled people, leaving them worse off than before and increasing disability-related socio-economic inequalities.
The aim of this paper is to compare the short-term impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and associated lockdown on the employment and financial security of working age adults with and without disabilities in the UK.
Main finding of this study
The results of our analyses indicated that, during the first 3 months of the introduction of the first lockdown in the UK, respondents with disability were more likely than their peers to be working reduced hours and experience higher levels of financial stress. These differences were attenuated, but not eliminated, when estimates were adjusted to take account of pre-lockdown financial status. These findings are notable given that far fewer people with disability were employed in the months before COVID-19, so a smaller overall proportion of people with disability were affected by COVID-19-related job loss or reduction in hours.
What is already known on this topic
Considerable concern has been expressed about the extent to which people with disabilities, and those who support them, may be particularly vulnerable to negative impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic.28–39 However, to date little published research has attempted to characterize or quantify the risks faced by people with disabilities in relation to COVID-19.14,15,17,18,40
What this study adds
These results suggest that working age adults with disability, a group who are generally more likely to be exposed to financial stressors that are detrimental to health and wellbeing,1–9 were being particularly disadvantaged by the financial impact of lockdown. Comments from the UN Secretary-General António Guterres provide important context for these results; in May he stated a need for a disability-inclusive COVID-19 response, contending that the pandemic presents an opportunity to design and build more inclusive and accessible societies.41 The results of this analysis suggest that these pleas have either not been heeded, or if measures have been implemented, they have so far been ineffectual.
Limitations of this study
Our study has a number of limitations. First, only half of the adult respondents in Wave 9 participated in either the April to June COVID-19 surveys, introducing potential selection bias if the associations between disability and financial outcomes were different among respondents and non-respondents. Second, ‘Understanding Society’ is a general household panel survey and, as such, excludes people living in institutional settings (e.g. care homes, barracks). This will have led to the exclusion of a proportion of working-age adults with very severe disabilities, which may have led to an underestimation of the differences between people with and without disabilities. Third, while internet access in the UK is generally very high, the use of an online response format may have led to bias in response rates among participants with disabilities associated with reduced cognitive capacity.
The study also has a number of strengths. ‘Understanding Society’ is one of the few longitudinal studies worldwide, which has data on participants prior to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Most studies of the impacts of COVID-19 have been cross-sectional raising the possibility of reverse causation and increasing the likelihood of differential and/or dependent misclassification where effect estimates may be biased away from the null in an unknown direction.
Results
During the first 3 months of the introduction of the COVID-19 lockdown in the UK, respondents with disability were more likely than their peers to be working reduced hours and experience higher levels of financial stress. These differences were attenuated, but not eliminated, when estimates were adjusted to take account of pre-lockdown financial status.
Conclusions
Working age adults with disability were particularly disadvantaged by the financial impact of the COVID-19 lockdown in the UK. The UN Secretary-General António Guterres has stated the need for a disability-inclusive COVID-19 government response. The results of our analysis suggest that these pleas have either not been heeded, or if measures have been implemented, they have so far been ineffectual in the UK.
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