Additional Context: This information comes from a report produced by Inclusive Development Partners, or IDP, a research and technical assistance organization. Using a mixed-methods design under IRB approval from the University of Massachusetts Boston, the study triangulated a global survey of staff from 82 projects across 80 implementing organizations with key informant interviews and focus group discussions across eight countries where IDP had existing programs: Bangladesh, El Salvador, Kenya, Liberia, Malawi, Nepal, Nigeria, and Pakistan. Data collection took place between January and March 2026.

Respondents were consistent in attributing the placement of their children in institutions not to any change in family attitudes toward disability but to the removal of practical support (access to education, assistive devices, etc.) that had made institutional placement unnecessary. Families that had been managing, with support, found themselves suddenly struggling to manage without it, overnight and without warning.

In their analysis, IDP notes that the drivers of this trend are structural and were consistently identified across multiple country contexts. The dismantling of USAID has set in motion a trend that decades of research warn against. Institutionalization causes profound and often irreversible harm, particularly to children, and the rise that has been documented across these country contexts is not a temporary service gap that future programming can easily correct.

Source: Inclusive Development Partners