Replies to LegCo questions

Legislative Council Question No. 1 (Oral Reply)

Date of Sitting: 16 January 2002

Asked by: Hon LAW Chi-kwong

Replied by: Secretary for Health and Welfare

Question :

At present, persons who have been determined by the relevant authorities as "severely disabled" (including those who are bedridden due to illness) are eligible for Normal Disability Allowance; and those severely disabled persons who have been certified as being "in need of constant attendance from others in their daily lives" are entitled to Higher Disability Allowance.  However,  those who are chronically ill but not bedridden are not eligible for disability allowances, even if they have lost their earning capacity.  According to the findings of a survey conducted by the Administration, among the 882 700 persons with chronic illness in the territory, about 12% are not able to work or attend school and require others to take care of their daily lives.  In this connection, will the Government inform this Council:

(a) of the justifications for including "being bedridden" as a requisite for the chronically ill to be qualified for disability allowances;

(b) whether the granting of disability allowances to the chronically ill who have lost their earning capacity is in line with the objective of setting up the disability allowance scheme; and

(c)  whether it will consider granting disability allowances to the chronically ill who have been certified by the relevant authorities as having lost their earning capacity but are not being bedridden; if it will not, of the reasons for that?

Reply :

Madam President,

By way of background, the objective of Disability Allowance (DA), one of the two allowances (the other allowance is Old Age Allowance) under the Social Security Allowance Scheme, is to provide some measure of financial assistance on a non-means-tested and non-contributory basis for severely disabled persons to meet their special needs arising from disability.  The purpose of DA is to assist those who are least able to help themselves.

A person is considered to be 'severely disabled� within the meaning of this Scheme if he is certified by the Director of Health or the Chief Executive, Hospital Authority (or under exceptional circumstances by a registered medical practitioner of a private hospital) as being in a position broadly equivalent to a person with a 100% loss of earning capacity according to the criteria in the First Schedule of the Employees� Compensation Ordinance (Cap. 282), and may qualify for Normal DA.  To qualify for Higher DA, a severely disabled person must be in need of constant attendance from others in his daily life but is not receiving such care in a government or subvented institution or a medical institution under the Hospital Authority.

(a) As regards question (a), �being bedridden� is not the only criterion for the chronically ill to qualify for DA.  Any person, including a chronically ill person, can be eligible for DA if he is medically certified to be falling into one of the following categories:

1) disabling physical condition or blind;

2) disabling mental condition; or

3) profoundly deaf

�Disabling physical condition or blind� means that the person is in a position broadly equivalent to a person with a 100% loss of earning capacity according to the criteria in the First Schedule of the Employees� Compensation Ordinance (Cap. 282):

1) loss of functions of two limbs;

2) loss of functions of both hands or all fingers and both thumbs;

3) loss of functions of both feet;

4) total loss of sight;

5) total paralysis (quadriplegia);

6) paraplegia;

7) illness, injury or deformity resulting in being bedridden; and

8) any other conditions resulting in total disablement.

�Disabling mental condition� means that the person is medically certified to be suffering from a mental condition which produces a degree of disability broadly equivalent to a person with a 100% loss of earning capacity.

�Profoundly deaf� means that the person suffers from a perceptive or mixed deafness with a hearing loss of 85 decibels or more in the better ear for pure tone frequencies of 500, 1 000 and 2 000 cycle per second, or 75 to 85 decibels with other physical handicaps such as lack of speech and distortion of hearing.

Any chronically ill person who is not bedridden may qualify for DA, if he is physically or mentally disabled or profoundly deaf as defined above.

(b) & (c) With regard to questions (b) and (c), as pointed out above, chronically ill persons can be eligible for DA if they are medically certified as being in a position broadly equivalent to a person with a 100% loss of their earning capacity.