Access to sport shouldn't be a hurdle to better health

Sport is such a vital aspect of life, it allows for us to connect to others, to pursue our fitness goals and improve health outcomes. Often, it is an epicentre in which many factions of the local community come together to celebrate at an event, which fosters a sense of spirit while cheering for teams to win. However, what often is not realised is that we all don't have equal access to such opportunities; individuals with a disability have additional barriers to this wonderful form of teamwork, interaction and health promotion. These hurdles include transport, specialised equipment to actually engage in sporting activities and perhaps even apprehension about participation if there isn't a specialised team for solely persons with a disability. However, these factors could be remedied given proper intervention by organisations, governments and community institutions. This could involve programs informing families of opportunities to get their children involved or even creating specific groups where kids with disabilities can come together to develop their skills, sportsmanship and relationships with others in a variety of different sports.

An example of such an inequality due to a lack of an available experience, was an absence of sporting junior camps for kids with disabilities in Queensland. Abbi Brass however, in an article called 'Sports breeds support' in the magazine Travel without limits, expressed how she approached the CEO of Variety Queensland about this issue. It received a proactive and enthusiastic response, resulting in the Variety Kids Sports Camp first held at the Runaway Bay Sports Super Centre in 2019. This enables kids to learn new sports such as track, tennis, wheelchair skills to adapt to the activities and much more. It also allows for them to interact with Paralympians as role models, inspiring kids to pursue whatever they want to do, even sport regardless of the perceived challenges. This program has attempted to fill a gap, and is a model for how other states and even local areas should respond to encourage children with disabilities to be more engaged physically and attain the same opportunities without the fear of judgement, discrimination or exclusion.

If you are interested in reading the article by Abbi Brass, you can find it here at https://www.travelwithoutlimits.com.au/variety-kids-sports-camp/