TRENTO. Luca (the name is fictional) is suffering from juvenile diabetes. The disease severely affects the life of the boy and his parents.
Yet in Trentino, unlike the rest of Italy, the civil invalidity of young people suffering from diabetes mellitus (for Luca also celiac disease), is not automatically recognized by the Province, as happens in the rest of the country.
Luca’s parents had to sue the Province to ascertain that the pathological state affecting the minor is such as to recognize the child as an invalid civil minor, with the right to receive the relative allowance provided by a law of 1998 to help families.
Thanks to what we could define as a “pilot cause”, for hundreds of young Trentino diabetic patients, the right to automatic recognition is perhaps approaching of the condition of disability.
This even though Luca, despite many difficulties, leads a life full of stimuli: he attended school successfully, played various sports, played an instrument. In short, he leads a life similar to that of his peers but much more demanding because the boy must always be in contact with his parents to intervene if the blood sugar values require it.
The boy, now 15 years old, legally represented by his parents, sponsored by the lawyer Lorenzo Eccher, won the lawsuit filed against the Province.
In fact, the Court found that the applicant has been in a state of civil invalidity since July 2017 “As the bearer of persistent difficulties in carrying out the task and functions of one’s age”. The Province must therefore pay the child, starting from the same date in July 2017, the monthly allowance for disabled civilians minors. The confrontation on the judicial field essentially centered around a question: the judge asked the technical consultant to ascertain “whether the minor, due to the pathology from which he is suffering, has persistent difficulties in carrying out the tasks and functions proper to his age” .
The life of a boy with diabetes mellitus is certainly very demanding.
“The indications on the quantity of insulin come from the parents – the sentence reads – informed by their son Luca who communicates the glycemic value to them, but the whole phase of detection and consequent administration is carried out independently”.
So it’s fair to say that “Without the constant presence of his parents Luca should give up doing activities in the company of his peers”.
According to the judge, “it can be considered that the plaintiff, when he is about to perform physical activity, encounters” persistent difficulties “in the sense that, especially when the blood sugar falls below the value of 80mg / dl (an event that can also occur every day) he is forced to turn to his parents for information on what to do, more precisely to know if he has to eat something or wait to start the activity, or he has to add insulin or he has to give up doing the activity ».
Luca can therefore continue to play and play sports, but he must be careful and always attentive to insulin values. He is therefore a normal boy, with one more difficulty than his peers.
For this reason the judge recognized the right to receive the disability allowance. The sentence, of course, concerns only Luca and his parents, but it could set a precedent.
Faced with the possible “rain” of similar appeals, the Province could return to think about the possibility of applying the orientation of the INPS also in Trentino: “For minors suffering from type 1 diabetes mellitus, in any case, the existence of persistent difficulties in carrying out the tasks and functions proper to age must be recognized”. S. D.