Disability activists have said banning under-16s from social media risks cutting off a “lifeline for friendship” for disabled children and could push them into social isolation by preventing them from making connections online.

Charities and high-profile figures in disability advocacy said they were concerned that a blanket ban on social media would disproportionately affect teenagers who may not be able to meet people easily in real life or find peers with similar conditions.

Lucy Edwards, a blind broadcaster, author and disability activist, said while she was pleased to see the government taking online safety seriously, she believed a social media ban would have serious unintended consequences.

She said: “I got 99.9% of my support via the internet as a young visually impaired girl. I was 11 and I didn’t know anyone in my real life who was blind, so naturally I took to social media. I would talk to friends on the other side of the planet – I can’t emphasise enough that no one I was friends with [in person] understood my vision loss like my friends online.”

She said the ban would prevent teenagers from discovering voices and influencers online who had similar sight impairments or disabilities and who would become positive role models.

“If you block young visually impaired people from social media, you are restricting them from finding the independence they might not know they can have,” she said.

On Monday, Keir Starmer announced he would ban all major social media platforms for under-16s, including Snapchat, Facebook, TikTok, YouTube and Instagram, as well as blocking livestreaming functions.

He said the policy was not “cost-free” and social media had brought benefits to young people, but a “total ban is the right choice”.

Dr Shani Dhanda, a broadcaster, author and accessibility consultant who has brittle bone disease, said social media were a “lifeline for friendship, support and connection” for many young disabled people. “The focus should be on making platforms safer, not cutting young people off from communities they rely on to participate in society,” she said.

The Royal Society for Blind Children said it was actively working to counter the ban by expanding its own online clubs and groups. The charity said that while it supported better age-appropriate protections on social media, a ban risked “cutting off vital routes to connection for children who are already too often excluded”.

Lily Rose, the chief operating officer at the charity, said: “You might be the only young person in your school or for miles around who is experiencing vision impairment, and social media might be your only way of finding communities you can relate to. So we’re already looking at how we can bridge that gap when the ban comes into effect.”

Dr Amit Patel, a former trauma doctor turned disability rights campaigner who lost his sight in 2013, said he understood the need to keep children safe online but thought the ban risked “oversimplifying a complex issue”.

“Many disabled young people already face barriers to socialising and participating in their communities,” he said. “For them, social media is often far more than entertainment. It can be a lifeline that provides friendship, peer support, role models and a sense of belonging that may not always be available offline. Any policy in this area needs to consider the unintended consequences for groups who already experience exclusion and isolation.”

The Department for Science, Innovation and Technology has been contacted for comment.