21 August 2009
HEARING AWARENESS WEEK
Senator Mitch Fifield, the Coalition’s spokesman for Disabilities, today welcomed the start of Hearing Awareness Week, 23-29 August 2009.
One in six Australians suffer from some form of hearing loss.
Hearing Awareness Week seeks to promote ways in which hearing loss can be prevented, and highlight the tools and technologies available to assist those who have a hearing impairment or are deaf.
“I encourage all Australians to use Hearing Awareness Week to have their hearing tested, and to think about ways that they can protect their hearing.
“Preventative measures like reducing the volume on your MP3 player or wearing ear plugs whilst working with machinery can help avoid hearing loss,” Senator Fifield said.
As part of Hearing Awareness Week, Senator Fifield will have his hearing tested at Absolute Hearing in Dingley Village on Wednesday 26 August.
Senator Fifield, along with Senator Siewert and Parliamentary Secretary Bill Shorten, helped launch a Deafness Technology Demonstration in Parliament House this week.
“There are an enormous number of exciting technologies becoming available to deaf and hearing impaired Australians. At the technology demonstration this week in Parliament we saw innovative tools for coping with hearing loss including an iphone application to teach Auslan (Australian sign language) and a video relay service which allows a deaf person to communicate using Auslan across the internet,” said Senator Fifield.
For more information, visit: http://hearingawarenessweek.org.au/