Divya Goel, a 35-year-old deaf-blind woman in Orlando, Florida, has had two telemedicine doctors' appointments during the pandemic. Each time, she was denied an interpreter.
Her doctors told her she would have to get insurance to pay for an interpreter, which is incorrect: Under federal law, it is the physician's responsibility to provide one.
Goel's mother stepped in to interpret instead. But her signing is limited, so Goel, who has only some vision, is not sure her mother fully conveyed what the doctors said. Goel worries about the medical ramifications — a wrong medicine or treatment — if something got lost in translation.
"It's really, really hard to get real information, and so I feel very stuck in my situation," she signed through an interpreter.
Telemedicine, teleworking, rapid tests, virtual school, and vaccine drive-thrus have become part of Americans' routines as they enter Year 3 of life amid covid-19. But as innovators have raced to make living in a pandemic world safer, some people with disabilities have been left behind.
Those with a physical disability may find the at-home covid tests that allow reentry into society hard to perform. Those with limited vision may not be able to read the small print on the instructions, while
