For many Ontario families, cost puts an accessible van out of reach
Houston Chronicle photo above of a family that received an accessible van from a Houston children's charity.
By Louise Kinross
Minivans are expensive. Most cost over $30,000. Now imagine you have to pay an extra $20,000 on top of that to adapt a vehicle so that it accommodates your child's wheelchair.
"We have many low-income families who would love to have an accessible vehicle for their child," says Erin Brandon, a nurse practitioner at Holland Bloorview who works with families of children who require 24-7 care for complex medical problems.
Relying on Wheel-Trans can be unreliable, must be pre-planned and can double how long it takes to get somewhere, Erin says. "I've also had families who had to wait many hours after their appointments to be picked up. What could have been a one-hour visit might turn into a four- to eight-hour day at the hospital."
Covid-19 has made owning a vehicle more urgent for these families because their medically fragile children are at high risk of contracting the virus on public transit.
Jalaldeen Assan-Lebbe, who goes by Deen, says his Toronto family has been stuck in their apartment since their old accessible van was damaged in an accident two years ago. Deen's son Aadhil, 16, has cerebral palsy and multiple disabilities.
"He has many many medical appointments, so our life was spent in the van, and now we're very isolated," Deen says. "There is no choice that we have to use a taxi during Covid, because we don't feel safe on public transit. But I'm not working at the moment, and that's the main reason we can't afford taxis. This year has been very hard."
Aadhil used to have a nurse come to the house during the day, but the family stopped the care as a Covid protection. "We don't know if they're vaccinated, and we don't know how many other families they're visiting."
Deen would like to take his son and other children to a park or out swimming, "but we can't go," he says. Due to the cost, buying a new or used minivan and adapting it is out of the question.
While Easter Seals and the March of Dimes help cover the cost of modifying a minivan, no Ontario charity helps with the cost of purchasing a new vehicle.
Until 2018, President's Choice Children's Charity provided financial grants for equipment for children with disabilities, including contributing towards a minivan's purchase price. The charity helped about 30,000 children with disabilities over a 28-year period, says Executive Director Lisa Battistelli. In 2018, the Loblaw charity changed its mission to focus on child hunger. "Since our shift to this singular focus, President's Choice Children's Charity has been able to do more for Canadian children, reaching an average of 800,000 annually with good food, every day," Lisa says.
No other foundation has stepped up to fill the funding gap for families of children with disabilities.
"This is a problem that keeps coming up for the families I see, who feel more isolated than ever due to Covid," Erin says.
