COVID-19 pandemic reversed decades of employment gains for disabled, but advocates see glimmers of hope
This October marks the 75th annual Disability Employment Awareness month.
ByCatherine Thorbecke
October 1, 2020, 10:23 AM
• 13 min read
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Catch up on the developing stories making headlines.
Courtesy of Jina Sawani Musto
Dr. Oluwaferanmi Okanlami, or “Dr. O” for short, is a former All-American college athlete and Stanford University track team captain. He now works as a physician and medical school professor with a handful of degrees and titles under his belt.
Still, Okanlami says he is aware that some just see him as a “Black man who uses a wheelchair.”
“Disability is one of the only things that we characterize someone by that,” he said. “I have people that will see me and they’ll say, ‘Well, what do we call you?”
“Should I say ‘handicapped,’ should I say ‘disabled,’ should I say ‘differently-abled’?” he added. “You could have picked my name. You could have picked ‘doctor.'”
The University of Michigan professor was left paralyzed from the chest down seven years ago following a diving accident. After intensive vocational therapy, Okanlami said he was able to reenter the workforce and [...]