[Sigia-l] Web Accessibility on Government Websites outside US

[Jennifer Healy]

>1.    Is there a need to justify the necessity since the disabled community
	 is relatively small?

The disabled population in the U.S. is, in fact, relatively large. I assume
these numbers would be similar across industrialized countries of the world.

Twenty percent (52.6 million people) of the U.S. population has some kind of
disability, including visual and mobility limitations as well as hearing,
cognitive and others (e.g., learning disabilities and reading disorders). As
one might expect, however, people with disabilities are half as likely to
have Internet access as non-disabled people. 

The 2000 Census reports that 12.4 percent of the U.S. population is age 65
or older; approximately half of those over 65 have a disability. However,
this age group makes up only 5 percent of the Internet population. Although
visual and mobility accessibility issues for this small portion of online
users may seem insignificant, 50 - 64 year olds make up one-quarter of the
online population, forecasting considerable growth in the number of elderly
Internet users in just the next few years.