A story from rural Vietnam ....

This news story about a group of nuns transporting children with Down syndrome in rural Vietnam to and from school by motorbike, tells of very different opportunities for these families, from those that we enjoy here in Australia, particularly in urban areas.

Vietnamese families with children with disabilities are relatively disadvantaged in Australia, too, as there is little information available in Vietnamese, few bilingual workers with expertise in Down syndrome, and it can be difficult for them to obtain services at optimum levels. Cultural sensitivities also need to be attended to.

Down Syndrome NSW has some funding that enables us to produce a small portfolio of translations, and to run annual workshops for Vietnamese speaking families, with the assistance of an interpreter. (A similar program is funded for Arabic speaking families, and is being developed for Chinese speaking families). Translations produced so far can be accessed from our website, here; and we recommend that Vietnamese speaking families contact the Vietnamese Support Group for Parents of Disabled Children in NSW, contact details here, in both Vietnamese and English.