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In 2024, the U.S. states with the highest share of the population that had a disability were West Virginia, Mississippi, and Kentucky. At that time, around 20 percent of the population of West Virginia had some form of disability. The states with the lowest rates of disability were Colorado, New Jersey, and Minnesota. 

Disability in the United States

A disability is any condition, either physical or mental, that impairs one’s ability to do certain activities. Some examples of disabilities are those that affect one’s vision, hearing, movement, or learning. It is estimated that around 14 percent of the population in the United States suffers from some form of disability. The prevalence of disability increases with age, with 45 percent of those aged 75 years and older with a disability, compared to just six percent of those aged 5 to 15 years.

Vision impairment

One common form of disability comes from vision impairment. In 2023, around four percent of the population of West Virginia had a vision disability, meaning they were blind or had serious difficulty seeing even when wearing glasses. The leading causes of visual disability are age-related and include diseases such as cataracts, glaucoma, and age-related macular degeneration. This is clear when viewing the prevalence of vision disability by age. It is estimated that 8.3 percent of those aged 75 years and older in the United States have a vision disability, compared to 4.3 percent of those aged 65 to 74 and only 0.9 percent of those aged 5 to 15 years.