Disability Justice and the COVID-19 Pandemic

Developed by Lachrista Greco, M.A., MLIS, Amelia Teske, and Karla Strand
Office of The Gender and Women’s Studies Librarian
University of Wisconsin System
2022

This bibliography is number 103a in the series “Sustaining Hope: Feminisms, Freedom, and the Future – A set of bibliographies supporting the 2023 Conference of the UW-System Women’s and Gender Studies Consortium” published by the University of Wisconsin System Office of the Gender and Women’s Studies Librarian. Please also see bibliography 98d. Many thanks to India-Bleu Niehoff for her assistance with this guide.

Introduction

In the face of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, disability justice advocates have highlighted the disproportionate health and socio-economic impacts on disabled people, including those who now live with long-COVID. Yet, as most sectors of society embrace a ‘return to normal,’ the impacts on people with chronic illnesses, immunocompromised health conditions, long-COVID, and other disabilities are unending. These inequities are exacerbated for Black, Indigenous, and people of color, women, and LGBTQ+ communities. For decades, the disability justice movement has focused on networks of mutual aid, sustainability, collective access, intersectionality, communal support, and cross-movement solidarity as a cornerstone of survival as well as permanent workplace and public policy measures. Yet, many of the  initiatives established during the early months of the pandemic have lost traction as vaccine requirements, mask mandates, and flexible work policies continue to decrease. This bibliography includes resources related to disability justice with a particular focus on the ongoing crisis for disabled people and the urgent need for permanent solutions that increase access, improve health outcomes, and codify disability rights as ‘the new normal.”