Global Report on Assistive Technology: moving forward

On 14 and 15 July, the World Health Organization (WHO), together with the Global Alliance of Assistive Technology Organizations (GAATO), co-led several sessions at the Joint International Conference on Digital Inclusion, Assistive Technology and Accessibility ICCHP-AAATE 2022 in Lecco, Italy, to disseminate the findings of the recently launched Global Report on Assistive Technology (GReAT).

The policy session on 14 July with the theme, "The WHO-UNICEF Global Report on Assistive Technology: Moving Forward Together," brought together panelists from different organizations to open a dialogue on the GReAT recommendations, exploring their implementation and identifying priorities for actions to advance access to assistive technology worldwide.

The inclusion forum on the second day themed, "Measuring population access to assistive technology," engaged global stakeholders to reflect on the measuring population access using the WHO rATA tool's methodology, process, and outcome and set up an action plan for data collection for the WHA Progress Report on improving access to assistive technology in 2026.

Two scientific sessions on both days presented the work the WHO and partners have done to collect data on population access to assistive technology. 11 countries presented their experiences and the findings of their investigations using the WHO rapid Assistive Technology Assessment tool (rATA). The methodology and findings are published here in the open access conference proceedings.

During the forum, the WHO Assistive Technology team launched a call for experts to form a working group on continued data collection on population access to assistive technology, including:

- further development and improvement of the WHO rATA questionnaire;

- an improvement on the data collection and analysis process for WHA Progress Report; and

- a global platform/forum for sharing data, knowledge, and experience.