Parents with disabled children are on the spot over mistreatment.
A study has found that some parents give their children drugs, especially those under the age of five, to contain them as they engage in other activities.
Beatrice Kathungu, a psychologist and lecturer at Kenyatta University who carried out the research, said yesterday some of them get exposed and hooked to the drugs.
She said some of the disabled children on the streets are used in drug trafficking. Kathungu sought to establish the lifetime prevalence of drug use among PWDs, the specific types of drugs they use and the age at which they start using them.
Children aged between five and nine, especially those with mental disability, are introduced to drugs by their parents to make them sleep, she said.
“The findings revealed that 35 per cent of the respondents had used some form of drug, with a 43.3 per cent having done so between the ages 15-19. Those aged between five and nine accounted for 14.2 per cent, while 10-14 had 22.8 per cent,” the study revealed.
The report says the mostly used drugs are alcoholic beverages at 28.2 per cent, tobacco products at 19.6 per cent, miraa at 14.8 per cent and marijuana at 9.2 per cent.
In Kenya, about three million people have some form of disability, which influences the way they conduct their daily functions, including movement from one place to the other.
“Efforts by the government to promote the rights of PWDs as seen in the initiatives by the Ministry of Education to enhance the wellbeing of children with disability by having them placed in mainstream schools may be undermined if PWDs, who are already vulnerable, suffer the effects of ADA,” she said.
According to the study, 19.7 per cent used drugs to cope with stress, 15.6 per cent to gain acceptance among peers, 13.1 to cope with bad treatment by society and 9.3 per cent to boost self-esteem.
Other factors were to deal with frustrations of immobility for those with movement challenges, communication for those with hearing impairment, social segregation, lack of information on side effects and exposure to drugs and excess money while begging in the streets.
“These factors point to the need for drug prevention policies and strategies that target their unique needs such as stigma, limited access to information and low self-esteem, which are commonly associated with disability and emerged as push factors for drug use,” Kathungu said.
She said information tools on drug use should be user-friendly, for instance braille for the visually impaired.