Alex Garcia, the “Gaucho”, is one of the most famous Persons with Rare Disease and Deafblind Persons in the world. He is an expert in special education at the Federal University of Santa Maria in the state of Rio Grande do Sul (UFSM/RS). He was the first Deafblind Person and Person with Hydrocephalus and Rare Disease to finish a post-graduate degree at a Brazilian university. He is the founder of the Gaucha Association of Parents and Friends of Deafblind people and people with Multiple Disabilities (AGAPASM).Footnote 1 In Brazil, he has conducted pioneering research to find Deafblind people throughout the state of Rio Grande do Sul, where he is considered “the father” of Deafblindness. Since 2004, as a volunteer, he has structured a programme of home care with families of Deafblind people in Brazil. The programme helps with information and educational orientation, with medical and social referrals, with the training of professionals to attend Deafblind people in their original places, adapting these spaces, and also with special programmes in schools. As a writer, he was the first Deafblind Person to write a book about education in Latin America. His book “Deafblindness: Empirical and Scientific” was published in 2008. He was the first Deafblind Person in Brazil and Latin America to participate in a training programme for teachers with total liberty, held in Cuiabá, in the state of Mato Grosso. He was also the first Deafblind Person in Brazil and Latin America to work in a training programme for teachers with total liberty, where he taught two people with disabilities (a young blind educator and a young deaf educator). Alex also writes for the magazine Reação. Alex Garcia was the only Deafblind Person in the world to participate in the High-Level Meeting on Disability and Development “The Way Forward: A Disability-Inclusive Development Agenda Towards 2015 and Beyond” held in 2013 at the United Nations headquarters in New York. Also in 2013 he was the proponent of a public hearing to promote social inclusion of people with Deafblindness – the first hearing to deal with the issue in the history of Brazil. Alex Garcia was one of the winners, in the category “Personalities”, of the Brasil Mais Inclusão Award 2016. Email: [email protected]. * * *
