World Hearing Day

World Hearing Day

World Hearing Day is an annual global advocacy event for raising awareness regarding hearing loss and promoting ear and hearing care. It is also a day for action to address hearing loss and related issues. Each year, this event is celebrated on March 3. The day focuses on a specific theme that the World Health Organization and its partners determine. The colors silver and gold represent hearing impairments.

Ear and hearing care for all! Let’s make it a reality. World Hearing Day promotes ear and hearing care across the world and raises awareness of how to prevent deafness and hearing loss.

According to the World Health Organization

• More than 360 million people live with disabling hearing loss.
• More than 1 billion people aged 12-35 years are at risk of hearing loss due to recreational noise exposure.
• Globally, the overall cost of not addressing hearing loss is more than $750 billion.

Communication is a basic human right. Unfortunately, in many parts of the world, communication difficulties and disorders are not recognized as a disability.

This year World Hearing Day stresses the following points:

• Ear and hearing problems are among the most common problems encountered in the community.
• Over 60% of these can be identified and addressed at the primary level of care.
• Integration of ear and hearing care into primary care services is possible through training and capacity building at this level.
• Such integration will benefit people and help countries move towards the goal of universal health coverage.

Ten facts about hearing loss you should know on World Hearing Day:

• Fact 1: There are around 360 million people with disabling hearing loss.
• Fact 2: Unaddressed hearing loss poses a global cost of $750 billion international dollars.
• Fact 3: Thirty-two million children have disabling hearing loss.
• Fact 4: Chronic ear infections are the leading cause of hearing loss.
• Fact 5: Nearly one in every three people over 65 years are affected by disabling hearing loss.
• Fact 6: Noise is a major avoidable cause of hearing loss.
• Fact 7: Hearing loss can be caused by occupational noise and the use ototoxic medications.
• Fact 8: People with hearing loss can benefit from devices such as hearing aids and cochlear implants.
• Fact 9: Sign language and captioning services facilitate communication with people who are deaf and hard of hearing.
• Fact 10: Sixty per cent of childhood hearing loss is preventable through public health actions.

Communicating with a hearing-impaired person

Communicating with someone who has a hearing loss need not be difficult. Here are some simple tips for communicating more effectively with someone who has a hearing loss:

• First, gain their attention. Face the person directly and, whenever possible, remain at the same eye level. Missing the beginning of the message can make understanding very difficult.
• Speak clearly; there is no need to shout.
• Make sure you keep your hands away from your face. Give the listener every chance to see your whole face.
• Reduce background noise (e.g., by turning off the radio or television). Relatively quiet listening conditions are recommended because this provides the best-possible voice reception and allows the listener to use any visual cues they may need to assist speech understanding.
• Make sure light is not shining in the listener’s eyes.
• If you’re not making yourself understood, find a different way of saying the same thing.
• Be aware that the listener may have difficulty understanding speech, even with a hearing aid. Some hearing-impaired people have more difficulty following a conversation than others.

Communication is a two-way process. Both the listener and the speaker need to take responsibility for clear communication.