COVID-19 Research Fund

The Melbourne Disability Institute, an interdisciplinary research institute at the University of Melbourne, has directed nearly $300,000 to fund 14 new projects designed to help support people with disabilities and their families and carers in the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond.

COVID-19 Research Fund
Awarded Projects 
Advisory Touchpoint Information for Researchers

People with disabilities are among those most at risk of contracting COVID-19 and experiencing the negative social, economic and health consequences.

The Melbourne Disability Institute, an interdisciplinary research institute at the University of Melbourne, has directed nearly $300,000 to fund 14 new projects designed to help support people with disabilities and their families and carers in the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond.  Further, we've been able to support 2 existing projects  which have been amended to incorporate new information on the Coronavirus.

Funded projects focus on a wide range of COVID-19 impacts, from tracking and improving remote learning and service delivery for people with disability, to maximising social connectedness through online music gatherings and a new digital platform connecting carers, and looking at ways to build resilience and continue care for Aboriginal communities.

The new way of delivering services virtually will be investigated through a range of projects looking at tele-health for family well-being, the impacts on early childhood intervention services, and providing resources for families and health professionals on early detection of infants with developmental disabilities.

Other projects are tracking the impact of COVID-19 on disability support workers, collecting evidence for the use of non- invasive ventilators in the home, and mapping networks of care to help prevent and respond to outbreaks among people with disability and their support networks.

All projects that have been selected specifically address an identified need, gap or deficiency in responses to COVID-19 which affects people with disability, their families and carers as well as rich collaborations with the disability and health sectors including advocacy groups, services and government.

Through this initiative, the MDI is hoping to encourage and support interdisciplinary projects with active partnerships with the disability sector to deliver evidence to support informed policy recommendations.

Read More here: PDF or Microsoft Word.

Contact us if you need this information in an accessible format such as large print or audio, please email md-i@unimelb.edu.au.

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Alongside our COVID-19 funding program, we can provide two areas of additional support to assist with your projects and translation of outcomes:

  • Policy translation. MDI can help fast-track research outputs to policy makers and can help create policy briefs and infographics where needed. Please note this in your application form.
  • Agile disability advisory touch point for researchers to seek quick input or advice from a small group of people with disability. We can advise on enquiries related to lived experience and involvement in research, including thoughts on language, framing, specific disability-type questions, and connecting to communities of interest. The Disability Advisory Touch Point aims to assist better and faster research that will have meaningful and timely outcomes for people with disability. While every effort will be made to meaningfully engage (employ) people with disability where ever possible, we support the need for fast movement and are here to help.  Read more or Contact Campbell Message campbell.message@unimelb.edu.au for advice, ideas or just to brainstorm.