More than 1,000 people with disabilities are engaged in physical culture and sports in the Vitebsk region

December 9, Vitebsk / Diana Kurilo - BELTA /. More than 1,000 people with disabilities are engaged in physical culture and sports in the Vitebsk region, the Vitebsk Regional Executive Committee's Labor, Employment and Social Protection Committee informed a BELTA correspondent. Conditions for free training for disabled people have been created in almost all regions of the region. Shooting, athletics, swimming, table tennis, mini-football, fencing are far from a complete list of sports that these people are fond of. They can compete in their skills in almost fifty competitions, which are held annually in the republic and the region. The team of Vitebsk visually impaired footballers became the winner of the Belarusian mini-football championship and is a participant in the European championship. Athletes from the region took part in the European and World Athletics Championships for the hearing impaired. At the XXI Deaflympics (World Games for the Deaf), which took place in Taipei (China) in September of this year, Vitebsk athlete Ekaterina Belaya won 2 gold medals in athletics as part of a relay. Unusual athletes are themselves the initiators of the creation of sports clubs. For example, Nikolai Bez'yazychny, a silver medalist of the XIII Paralympic Games in 2008 in Beijing in fencing, is the leader of the "Prometheus" sports and recreation club of the association of wheelchair users. Training camps are organized for athletes, and they undergo restorative rehabilitation at the regional sports medicine dispensary. According to the regional executive committee, sports and physical education are one of the components of the multifaceted process of rehabilitation, social adaptation and formation of an independent lifestyle for disabled people. -0-