The 1984 Paralympic Games were held in both Europe and North America.br />Initially, the four disability groups at the time were supposed to compete together in the USA, as the IOC had announced in 1977 that the 1984 Olympic Games would be held in Los Angeles. But the independent sports organisations for athletes with an impairment had no formal relations with the Olympic Organising Committee.
Therefore, in 1980, the American National Wheelchair Athletic Association, an affiliated organisation to the International Stoke Mandeville Games Federation, announced it would hold its own Games for wheelchair athletes in a separate location.
As a result, the other three impairment groups combined their efforts and chose New York as their Games venue.