![]() ![]() ![]() Last year, France launched the platform “Total Conversation” enabling people with disabilities to communicate with emergency services simultaneously through video, voice and text. “One of the main conclusions at the OSCE-Mission supported conference was that there is a need for introducing a national call center and mobile application able to provide early warning information in real-time in different formats: audio, video, and in sign language,” he says.Įmergency call centers exist in some EU countries, such as France. There is also a need to promote accessible communication between people with disabilities and the emergency services,” says Mihailo Gordić. “It is not only information accessibility that should be improved. Private TV stations with national coverage have no programmes adjusted to the needs of this vulnerable group. According to official data less than 3 percent of the media content of the Serbian public service media RTS1 is accessible to people with disabilities. Information accessibility for people with different disabilities should be improved in Serbia, not only at the time of emergencies. Some 50 participants from civil society, authorities from the Sector of Emergency Management of the Ministry of Interior and the media discuss how to improve the emergency early warning system for people with disabilities at an OSCE Mission-supported conference, Belgrade, 11 December 2019.(OSCE/Milan Obradovic) “The media should increase the use of sign language, subtitles and multicolor light signals in their contents during emergencies,” says Jovanović. Ivanka Jovanović, the Executive Director of the National Organization of Persons with Disabilities of Serbia says that in partnership with the media, there needs to be a protocol for better informing people with disabilities in emergencies. “It is important that we don’t get information late, as we did during the floods in 2014,” stresses Mihailo Gordić of the Association of the Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing Persons in Serbia. Information and communication accessibilityįor better emergency response, it is crucial that people with disabilities have access to reliable, up-to-date information in real-time. The National Organization of Persons with Disabilities of Serbia, with support of the Mission, has produced an audio version of this Family Guide, a brochure and a short video with instructions on how to help and protect people with different types of disabilities during emergencies and disasters. “Two hundred copies have been printed so far.” “As part of our efforts to make the Family Guide accessible to as many persons with disabilities as possible, we supported the printing of the Guide in Braille, the first such publication in Serbia tailored for people with visual impairment,” says Miroslav Kragić, OSCE Mission to Serbia’s National Project Officer. “I was eight months pregnant then,” recalls Aneta Eminagić Duraković from the Association of the Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing Persons in Serbia.Ī Family Guide for Emergency Preparedness and Response produced jointly with the Sector of Emergency Management of the Ministry of Interior, and with more than 130 thousand copies in print since 2012, is one of the OSCE Mission to Serbia’s most popular publications. A family from Užice, in which all members were deaf, was not aware that the bombing had started until someone left a message in their mailbox days after. In 1999, at the time of the bombing of Serbia, shelters were not accessible to people with reduced mobility, which led to the death of three people with physical disabilities in Belgrade.Īnother problem was that the early warning system was not efficient at the time. Some of the main problems include inaccessible escape routes from residential buildings and difficult to get to emergency shelters. Many people with physical disabilities live on higher floors and fear that they will not be able to evacuate because of the existing barriers and lack of disability-inclusive infrastructure. Similar concerns torment people with other types of disabilities. ![]() “I keep wondering, in case of fire, would I be able to persuade my daughter to jump down from the third floor onto the rescue mattress? We would both certainly benefit from a fire rescue drill, so we can have an idea of what to do if need be.” "We live on the third floor,” Lazić continues. “Fear of an emergency is the second strongest fear, after fear for my child's future once I am gone,” says Natalija Lazić, mother of an autistic child, from the Association for Assistance to Persons with Autism of Serbia. During an emergency or natural disaster, the safety of the entire population is at risk, but people with disabilities are particularly affected. Earthquakes, fires, and floods can occur suddenly and cause fear and panic in the affected population. ![]()
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