6 ms·

Covid Vaccine Websites Violate Disability Laws, Create Inequity for the Blind

36 points by alwillis 5y ago

alphabet9000 5y ago
The vaccines.gov website's Vaccine Finder requires javascript to run. It could have been served using HTML and a <form>.
- duskwuff 5y ago
  Javascript isn't an accessibility issue. Modern screen readers work by interacting with a standard web browser, not by implementing their own browser engine. Javascript doesn't inherently interfere with this in any way. The issue at hand is that these web sites lack accessibility information on some of their controls, making them difficult or impossible for a non-sighted user to interact with. This isn't a problem unique to Javascript; back in the day, one common cause of accessibility woes was the use of unlabelled imagemaps for navigation.
  - alphabet9000 5y ago
    interesting, i didn't know that - thanks. My comment about the site requiring javascript stems from my thinking how needlessly complicated the entire site seemed in general, beyond accessibility. Last year, I would try and open the Louisiana department of health website to look at covid statistics, and it would require about 70MB to load a small little box that displayed some numbers. The popular ArcGIS covid dashboard by Johns Hopkins was the same situation - a single page app that took tens of megabytes to load and was very slow - to the point where it would crash on my computer. It's made me think that specifically for issues of public health and public safety, a priority should be placed on making sure those websites load quickly and run smoothly. Edit - I misspoke when I said it needed 70MB to load - it was 9+ MB of data transferred, 70+ MB resources. Here's a video I saved of the page loading from last year [0] [0] http://telnet.asia/arcgisla.mp4 http://telnet.asia/arcgisla.mp4
    - WalterBright 5y ago
      On the other hand, people complain about my "old-fashioned" web sites that are just html and css. But they load really fast :-)
  - csande17 5y ago
    It is possible, with great effort, to create JavaScript-driven UI elements that work correctly when used with accessibility technology. But if you stick to standard form elements, that support often comes by default. For example, if the county dropdown box in the article had been a <select>, it would have automatically worked in the screen-reader without needing to write any additional code.
- userbinator 5y ago
  It's ridiculous that you're even being downvoted for what I think is a perfectly valid complaint, and one that I'm increasingly faced with these days. Scheduling appointments and such has been a solved problem for several decades; what are the chances that if this pandemic happened 20 years ago, sites for vaccinations would be usable with only basic HTML, and everyone, even the blind, can use? Instead, today we get sites that need to load dozens of MB of JS that's reinventing the wheel (and forgetting to reinvent accessibility), are hard to use even for sighted people thanks to stupid UI trends like hidden scrollbars and whitespace everywhere, and fail completely if your browser is even slightly older or otherwise unusual. There's really no reason for overcomplicating things other than web developers trying to justify their salary --- or Google attempting to make its effective browser monopoly even stronger. The continual churn of the web and the "doing less with more" direction that things are going is a horrible disease. This isn't progress; it's a regression. A very related discussion from not long ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25915313 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25915313
Johnny555 5y ago
Phone alternatives, when available, have been beset with their own issues, such as long hold times and not being available at all hours like websites. Just wondering, does the ADA require equal access, or a "reasonable accommodation", like a phone call center? I agree that the websites should be made accessible to the visually (or otherwise) impaired, but does the ADA actually require it?
- dehrmann 5y ago
  > not being available at all hours like websites Hah! Back when this was written, it wasn't like websites were available at all hours (the vaccine rush crashed some) or had open time slots to book.
ferdowsi 5y ago
It's worth remembering that there is a substantial gray area about the extent to which the ADA applies to websites, even government ones. If WebAIM is finding violations with WCAG 2.1, there's even less of a legal basis. Much of the legal thinking is based on reading between the lines of DOJ letters and wildly different state/federal lawsuit rulings. It's odd we haven't heard much about a current push from disability advocates to pass clearly worded web accessibility regulation in Congress now that there is a regulation friendly government in power.
- faeriechangling 5y ago
  It's a pretty good idea. Even a flawed set of standards would help to promote accessible web design and make it fast and inexpensive to make a website that more people can use beyond the ones used today.
Simulacra 5y ago
I'm sure all of this will get fixed, it was obviously rushed like the vaccine, mask policy, lockdown, and everything else. In a couple of years they'll fix it, just like Healthcare.gov.
- wffurr 5y ago
  It wasn't rushed enough. A basic HTML form with appropriate labels is perfectly accessible and super easy to write. It's custom controls and using JavaScript to make everything interactive that screws up accessibility, not just for blind users, but keyboard users too.
  - nobodyandproud 5y ago
    I hear this all the time and yet…nearly all of the websites failed. This tells me that “you have to go out of your way…” doesn’t tell the whole story. There’s clearly a disconnect between best-practice in-the-field UIs & framework; and what semantic web recommends. Rather than attacking the government websites and businesses, pushing tooling to enforce good semantics would surely would be better?
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - pseudalopex 5y ago
      Criticism isn't attack. Nearly all had some issue. It doesn't mean they were completely unusable. The disconnect is between common practice and good practice. Low contrast was 1 of the common problems. Usually this is a choice. And it's trivial to check.
    - wffurr 5y ago
      It never fails to amaze me how seemingly impossible it is to get a web development firm to just write: <form> <label>Full name: <input type="text"></label> <label>Date of birth: <input type="date"></label> <label>Zip code: <input type="text"></label> <input type="submit" value="Submit"> </form> And then sprinkle a little CSS on top to make the colors match the client's theme. It's really simple.
lmilcin 5y ago
> Create Inequity for the Blind I abhor this sentence. Think about this, if you organize a 5k run with cash prizes, are you "creating inequity" for the people who can't run? Does this mean we should make it unlawful to organize events that promote sports, because some part of population can't take part in it? If an application makes it easier for 99% of the people to vaccinate but does not make it easier for 1%, does it mean the application is bad? Does existence of the application make it more difficult for the blind to vaccinate? Also, think for a moment -- if everybody else vaccinates it also protects blind people, without having them to do anything. Waiting for perfect solutions when a solution is needed is best way to paralyze any organization and have no solution at all.
- klyrs 5y ago
  This isn't a cash prize for a fun run, it's a bunch of government run websites that are meant to facilitate a necessary and potentially life saving service to all residents. By making these sites inaccessible, they make it harder to access the vaccine. Article> Many covid vaccination registration and information websites at the federal, state and local levels violate disability rights laws, hindering the ability of blind people to sign up for a potentially lifesaving vaccine, a KHN investigation has found. > If an application makes it easier for 99% of the people to vaccinate but does not make it easier for 1%, does it mean the application is bad? If that 1% is a protected class (disabled) then it's illegal.
  - lmilcin 5y ago
    What about phone lines? These should also be illegal because deaf people can't use them.
    - klyrs 5y ago
      Deaf people access phone services through TTY/TDD. People who are deaf and blind can do the same with Braille.
      - lmilcin 5y ago
curiousgal 5y ago
It's called a disability for a reason. You don't just accuse things of "creating inequity" for merely existing. They should be accessible for all by all means but the title makes it seem like the only purpose of the websites is to vex blind people.
karaterobot 5y ago
I do not want to wade into the "should these vaccination websites be made accessible" argument. I think they should be, full stop. But, it isn't clear to me from this article the extent of the difficulty people are having, how many people are having issues, what those issues are, etc., and the overall tone of the piece seems light on information and heavy on righteous outrage. It's in that class of badly written articles that just wants people to be angry but not necessarily better informed.
- faeriechangling 5y ago
  Yeah what exact issues are being talked about? Also were any ADA laws broken, because that GREATLY impacts how I read into this story and where any problem (if any) may lie.
- pseudalopex 5y ago
  "In at least seven states, blind residents said they were unable to register for the vaccine through their state or local governments without help. Phone alternatives, when available, have been beset with their own issues, such as long hold times and not being available at all hours like websites." "Common programming failures that make sites hard to use for the visually impaired included text without enough contrast to distinguish words from the page’s background and images without alternative text explaining what they showed, the WebAIM survey showed. Even worse, portions of the forms on 19 states’ pages were built so that screen readers couldn’t decipher what information a user should enter on search bars or vaccine registration forms."
- jareds 5y ago
  I'm a totally blind software developer. I used two sites to sign up for a vaccine. The first site was a covid vaccine specific website. I was unable to use it with my screen reader. I can't remember the exact issue but it was something to do with a popup my screen reader could not interact with to select a date. Luckily I had family who were able to fill out the form for me with in a couple hours of opening availability. I was fortunate that my family were not in frontline jobs and could be at a computer when I needed them to be. The second site was a mobile health clinic that was targeting disabled and at risk individuals. That worked fine because there goal was to get vaccines in arms and not worry about the technology. They used signup genius which had no accessibility issues for me. I understand that accessibility is not always easy. I don't expect Xbox Live cloud to somehow magically make first person shooter games accessible. There's no reason in 2021 that a site that does nothing but have you fill out a basic form with the ability to select a date and time should be unusable with screen readers.
singlewind 5y ago
A useful accessibility is not cheap. Every project has its budget. Most of website still can be read out by text-to-voice software which should be good enough for information delivery. There is definitely something can be improved later.
- wffurr 5y ago
  It is cheap though, and easy too. A basic form with standard HTML controls and appropriate labels is perfectly accessible with very little effort. It takes effort to program custom dropdowns and other form elements and mangle a website into tag soup.
- faeriechangling 5y ago
  The budget to deal with the COVID pandemic is astronomical lol. The United States is literally throwing TRILLIONS at the pandemic. How many millions do you think adding these features would have cost? Sure you can improve it later, but it's somewhat pathetic this wasn't working nearly two years after a pandemic was announced and it was almost a given we were going to need such a website?
chihuahua 5y ago
Part of my work involves creating web UI, and the accessibility part of it is a bit annoying because I'm not very familiar with it. But then I think about the people who have to rely on screen reader tools and then my irritation seems insignificant in comparison. Just do it, there's no excuse for having non-accessible web UI. Also, if you're using either plain HTML or a library such as FluentUI that provides components with accessibility built-in, you get it without any effort. It's only when the designers make things complicated that it requires extra effort to make things accessible.
- wffurr 5y ago
  Custom dropdowns are the worst offenders. Most annoy keyboard users too and many are completely inaccessible. Replicating the accessibility and keyboard functionality built into a basic <select> tag is really hard. I wish developers would just use the plain <select> or just make it a text entry field instead.
dehrmann 5y ago
It might be worth adding "February 25, 2021" to the title. There's been a lot of complaining about the rollout in the US, but it mostly stopped when everyone who wanted a vaccine got one, and it became clear the US did one of the best jobs at getting people vaccinated after Israel and the UAE. If the people in this article couldn't call their doctors in May and get an appointment, they might have a point, but prioritizing getting people vaccinated and not worrying about details is part of why the US did such a good job. That, and securing contracts of lots of doses.
mjevans 5y ago
For assistants and advocates the website does have a section listing alternate methods of obtaining help; including via TTY and normal phone lines; as well as email. The CDC's website provides additional information which others might also recall from the announced launch of the website: https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/covid-19/reporting/vaccinefinder/about.html https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/covid-19/reporting/vaccinefinde... "Find a COVID-19 Vaccine: Search vaccines.gov, text your ZIP code to 438829, or call 1-800-232-0233 to find locations near you." """ Get Help Get answers to questions or help finding a vaccine near you. Help is available in English, Spanish, and many other languages. 1-800-232-0233 TTY 1-888-720-7489 Disability Information and Access Line (DIAL): 1-888-677-1199 DIAL@n4a.org """

36 points by alwillis 5y ago

The vaccines.gov website's Vaccine Finder requires javascript to run. It could have been served using HTML and a <form>.

duskwuff 5y ago
Javascript isn't an accessibility issue. Modern screen readers work by interacting with a standard web browser, not by implementing their own browser engine. Javascript doesn't inherently interfere with this in any way. The issue at hand is that these web sites lack accessibility information on some of their controls, making them difficult or impossible for a non-sighted user to interact with. This isn't a problem unique to Javascript; back in the day, one common cause of accessibility woes was the use of unlabelled imagemaps for navigation.
- alphabet9000 5y ago
  interesting, i didn't know that - thanks. My comment about the site requiring javascript stems from my thinking how needlessly complicated the entire site seemed in general, beyond accessibility. Last year, I would try and open the Louisiana department of health website to look at covid statistics, and it would require about 70MB to load a small little box that displayed some numbers. The popular ArcGIS covid dashboard by Johns Hopkins was the same situation - a single page app that took tens of megabytes to load and was very slow - to the point where it would crash on my computer. It's made me think that specifically for issues of public health and public safety, a priority should be placed on making sure those websites load quickly and run smoothly. Edit - I misspoke when I said it needed 70MB to load - it was 9+ MB of data transferred, 70+ MB resources. Here's a video I saved of the page loading from last year [0] [0] http://telnet.asia/arcgisla.mp4 http://telnet.asia/arcgisla.mp4
  - WalterBright 5y ago
    On the other hand, people complain about my "old-fashioned" web sites that are just html and css. But they load really fast :-)
- csande17 5y ago
  It is possible, with great effort, to create JavaScript-driven UI elements that work correctly when used with accessibility technology. But if you stick to standard form elements, that support often comes by default. For example, if the county dropdown box in the article had been a <select>, it would have automatically worked in the screen-reader without needing to write any additional code.
userbinator 5y ago
It's ridiculous that you're even being downvoted for what I think is a perfectly valid complaint, and one that I'm increasingly faced with these days. Scheduling appointments and such has been a solved problem for several decades; what are the chances that if this pandemic happened 20 years ago, sites for vaccinations would be usable with only basic HTML, and everyone, even the blind, can use? Instead, today we get sites that need to load dozens of MB of JS that's reinventing the wheel (and forgetting to reinvent accessibility), are hard to use even for sighted people thanks to stupid UI trends like hidden scrollbars and whitespace everywhere, and fail completely if your browser is even slightly older or otherwise unusual. There's really no reason for overcomplicating things other than web developers trying to justify their salary --- or Google attempting to make its effective browser monopoly even stronger. The continual churn of the web and the "doing less with more" direction that things are going is a horrible disease. This isn't progress; it's a regression. A very related discussion from not long ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25915313 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25915313

Johnny555 5y ago

Phone alternatives, when available, have been beset with their own issues, such as long hold times and not being available at all hours like websites. Just wondering, does the ADA require equal access, or a "reasonable accommodation", like a phone call center? I agree that the websites should be made accessible to the visually (or otherwise) impaired, but does the ADA actually require it?

dehrmann 5y ago
> not being available at all hours like websites Hah! Back when this was written, it wasn't like websites were available at all hours (the vaccine rush crashed some) or had open time slots to book.

ferdowsi 5y ago

It's worth remembering that there is a substantial gray area about the extent to which the ADA applies to websites, even government ones. If WebAIM is finding violations with WCAG 2.1, there's even less of a legal basis. Much of the legal thinking is based on reading between the lines of DOJ letters and wildly different state/federal lawsuit rulings. It's odd we haven't heard much about a current push from disability advocates to pass clearly worded web accessibility regulation in Congress now that there is a regulation friendly government in power.

faeriechangling 5y ago
It's a pretty good idea. Even a flawed set of standards would help to promote accessible web design and make it fast and inexpensive to make a website that more people can use beyond the ones used today.

Simulacra 5y ago

I'm sure all of this will get fixed, it was obviously rushed like the vaccine, mask policy, lockdown, and everything else. In a couple of years they'll fix it, just like Healthcare.gov.

wffurr 5y ago
It wasn't rushed enough. A basic HTML form with appropriate labels is perfectly accessible and super easy to write. It's custom controls and using JavaScript to make everything interactive that screws up accessibility, not just for blind users, but keyboard users too.
- nobodyandproud 5y ago
  I hear this all the time and yet…nearly all of the websites failed. This tells me that “you have to go out of your way…” doesn’t tell the whole story. There’s clearly a disconnect between best-practice in-the-field UIs & framework; and what semantic web recommends. Rather than attacking the government websites and businesses, pushing tooling to enforce good semantics would surely would be better?
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - pseudalopex 5y ago
    Criticism isn't attack. Nearly all had some issue. It doesn't mean they were completely unusable. The disconnect is between common practice and good practice. Low contrast was 1 of the common problems. Usually this is a choice. And it's trivial to check.
  - wffurr 5y ago
    It never fails to amaze me how seemingly impossible it is to get a web development firm to just write: <form> <label>Full name: <input type="text"></label> <label>Date of birth: <input type="date"></label> <label>Zip code: <input type="text"></label> <input type="submit" value="Submit"> </form> And then sprinkle a little CSS on top to make the colors match the client's theme. It's really simple.

lmilcin 5y ago

> Create Inequity for the Blind I abhor this sentence. Think about this, if you organize a 5k run with cash prizes, are you "creating inequity" for the people who can't run? Does this mean we should make it unlawful to organize events that promote sports, because some part of population can't take part in it? If an application makes it easier for 99% of the people to vaccinate but does not make it easier for 1%, does it mean the application is bad? Does existence of the application make it more difficult for the blind to vaccinate? Also, think for a moment -- if everybody else vaccinates it also protects blind people, without having them to do anything. Waiting for perfect solutions when a solution is needed is best way to paralyze any organization and have no solution at all.

klyrs 5y ago
This isn't a cash prize for a fun run, it's a bunch of government run websites that are meant to facilitate a necessary and potentially life saving service to all residents. By making these sites inaccessible, they make it harder to access the vaccine. Article> Many covid vaccination registration and information websites at the federal, state and local levels violate disability rights laws, hindering the ability of blind people to sign up for a potentially lifesaving vaccine, a KHN investigation has found. > If an application makes it easier for 99% of the people to vaccinate but does not make it easier for 1%, does it mean the application is bad? If that 1% is a protected class (disabled) then it's illegal.
- lmilcin 5y ago
  What about phone lines? These should also be illegal because deaf people can't use them.
  - klyrs 5y ago
    Deaf people access phone services through TTY/TDD. People who are deaf and blind can do the same with Braille.
    - lmilcin 5y ago

curiousgal 5y ago

It's called a disability for a reason. You don't just accuse things of "creating inequity" for merely existing. They should be accessible for all by all means but the title makes it seem like the only purpose of the websites is to vex blind people.

karaterobot 5y ago

I do not want to wade into the "should these vaccination websites be made accessible" argument. I think they should be, full stop. But, it isn't clear to me from this article the extent of the difficulty people are having, how many people are having issues, what those issues are, etc., and the overall tone of the piece seems light on information and heavy on righteous outrage. It's in that class of badly written articles that just wants people to be angry but not necessarily better informed.

faeriechangling 5y ago
Yeah what exact issues are being talked about? Also were any ADA laws broken, because that GREATLY impacts how I read into this story and where any problem (if any) may lie.
pseudalopex 5y ago
"In at least seven states, blind residents said they were unable to register for the vaccine through their state or local governments without help. Phone alternatives, when available, have been beset with their own issues, such as long hold times and not being available at all hours like websites." "Common programming failures that make sites hard to use for the visually impaired included text without enough contrast to distinguish words from the page’s background and images without alternative text explaining what they showed, the WebAIM survey showed. Even worse, portions of the forms on 19 states’ pages were built so that screen readers couldn’t decipher what information a user should enter on search bars or vaccine registration forms."
jareds 5y ago
I'm a totally blind software developer. I used two sites to sign up for a vaccine. The first site was a covid vaccine specific website. I was unable to use it with my screen reader. I can't remember the exact issue but it was something to do with a popup my screen reader could not interact with to select a date. Luckily I had family who were able to fill out the form for me with in a couple hours of opening availability. I was fortunate that my family were not in frontline jobs and could be at a computer when I needed them to be. The second site was a mobile health clinic that was targeting disabled and at risk individuals. That worked fine because there goal was to get vaccines in arms and not worry about the technology. They used signup genius which had no accessibility issues for me. I understand that accessibility is not always easy. I don't expect Xbox Live cloud to somehow magically make first person shooter games accessible. There's no reason in 2021 that a site that does nothing but have you fill out a basic form with the ability to select a date and time should be unusable with screen readers.

singlewind 5y ago

A useful accessibility is not cheap. Every project has its budget. Most of website still can be read out by text-to-voice software which should be good enough for information delivery. There is definitely something can be improved later.

wffurr 5y ago
It is cheap though, and easy too. A basic form with standard HTML controls and appropriate labels is perfectly accessible with very little effort. It takes effort to program custom dropdowns and other form elements and mangle a website into tag soup.
faeriechangling 5y ago
The budget to deal with the COVID pandemic is astronomical lol. The United States is literally throwing TRILLIONS at the pandemic. How many millions do you think adding these features would have cost? Sure you can improve it later, but it's somewhat pathetic this wasn't working nearly two years after a pandemic was announced and it was almost a given we were going to need such a website?

chihuahua 5y ago

Part of my work involves creating web UI, and the accessibility part of it is a bit annoying because I'm not very familiar with it. But then I think about the people who have to rely on screen reader tools and then my irritation seems insignificant in comparison. Just do it, there's no excuse for having non-accessible web UI. Also, if you're using either plain HTML or a library such as FluentUI that provides components with accessibility built-in, you get it without any effort. It's only when the designers make things complicated that it requires extra effort to make things accessible.

wffurr 5y ago
Custom dropdowns are the worst offenders. Most annoy keyboard users too and many are completely inaccessible. Replicating the accessibility and keyboard functionality built into a basic <select> tag is really hard. I wish developers would just use the plain <select> or just make it a text entry field instead.

dehrmann 5y ago

It might be worth adding "February 25, 2021" to the title. There's been a lot of complaining about the rollout in the US, but it mostly stopped when everyone who wanted a vaccine got one, and it became clear the US did one of the best jobs at getting people vaccinated after Israel and the UAE. If the people in this article couldn't call their doctors in May and get an appointment, they might have a point, but prioritizing getting people vaccinated and not worrying about details is part of why the US did such a good job. That, and securing contracts of lots of doses.

mjevans 5y ago

For assistants and advocates the website does have a section listing alternate methods of obtaining help; including via TTY and normal phone lines; as well as email. The CDC's website provides additional information which others might also recall from the announced launch of the website: https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/covid-19/reporting/vaccinefinder/about.html https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/covid-19/reporting/vaccinefinde... "Find a COVID-19 Vaccine: Search vaccines.gov, text your ZIP code to 438829, or call 1-800-232-0233 to find locations near you." """ Get Help Get answers to questions or help finding a vaccine near you. Help is available in English, Spanish, and many other languages. 1-800-232-0233 TTY 1-888-720-7489 Disability Information and Access Line (DIAL): 1-888-677-1199 DIAL@n4a.org """