More Children to Get Disability Benifits : Health: Government will now weigh how medical conditions affect daily activities. The new rule may aid as many as 37,000 recepients a year.

The government has approved regulations expanding by tens of thousands the number of poor children entitled to disability benefits each year, Administration officials said.

The regulations were scheduled for release today and will be effective immediately, according to a description obtained by the Associated Press.

The changes were ordered nearly a year ago by the Supreme Court after advocates complained that the Administration had delayed formulating the regulations.

Under the new rules, the government for the first time will consider not only children’s medical conditions but also the effect those conditions have on their ability to walk, eat, dress and perform other daily activities.

The change is expected to add as many as 37,000 children a year with severe physical and mental disabilities to the Supplemental Security Income program who would not previously have qualified for benefits.

The Administration estimates that the new guidelines will cost $2.5 billion to $3.5 billion over the next five years.

“These new rules greatly enhance the protections we can provide to some of our most vulnerable citizens--children with disabilities,” Secretary of Health and Human Services Louis W. Sullivan said Sunday.

About 312,000 needy, disabled children receive SSI benefits, which average $387 a month. About half the applicants now qualify, but the Administration expects as many as 65% to qualify under the new plan.

By a 7-2 vote, the Supreme Court last year voided a government regulation that gave children seeking benefits less protection than adults. The old rule applied a rigid list of disorders--deafness, for example--to children but permitted adults to be judged on their ability to work.

The changes “bring Social Security’s evaluation of childhood disability into line with state-of-the-art practice in pediatric and adolescent medicine,” said Social Security Administration Commissioner Gwendolyn S. King.