Who needs BSL?

A deaf Eastbourne boy  [LINK] has called on the Chancellor to invest in life transforming therapy

11-year-old Sam Callaghan is urging the Chancellor to make a commitment to invest in the specialist therapy which supported him to listen and speak and allowed him to have the same opportunities as his hearing peers. Sam, from Eastbourne, was diagnosed as profoundly deaf as a baby and his parents were both devastated and scared for what the future would bring.

Now Sam is flourishing at secondary school, loves science and making films, and is always talking thanks to the specialist Auditory Verbal therapy programme he attended as a young child. To mark World Hearing Day (March 3) and ahead of the UK Government’s Spring Budget (March 6) Sam is urging the Chancellor to make a commitment to invest the necessary funding, of just over £2million a year for 10 years, to ensure all deaf children under five have the opportunity to access Auditory Verbal therapy which enabled him to thrive at school and beyond. 

ATR: Which is cheap enough given the many millions the state has thrown at BSL and culture to no avail. 

Mum Joanna explained: “When we received Sam’s diagnosis we were so worried about his future. Would he make friends? How would he get on at school and develop interests in everything life has to offer? “But thanks to Auditory Verbal therapy he is absolutely flying. He is a real chatterbox and never stops talking especially about the things he loves like science and he is doing brilliantly at secondary school. We will always be so grateful for the support we had and how Auditory Verbal therapy transformed his life.”

More than 90% of deaf children who could benefit from an Auditory Verbal therapy programme are currently unable to access it and there are only 31 specialist Auditory Verbal Therapists in the whole of the UK.  This is despite research by YouGov showing that 80% of adults in the South East of England believe Auditory Verbal therapy should be available to all deaf children via publicly funded services (ie, the NHS), while only 2% think it should be paid for privately.

Auditory Verbal therapy is a robust, evidence-based approach that supports deaf children to learn how to make sense of the sound they receive through their hearing technology (such as hearing aids or cochlear implants) so they can learn to talk like their hearing friends. Research shows that more than 80% of deaf children who attended an Auditory Verbal therapy programme for at least two years graduated with spoken language on a par with their hearing peers – this figure rose to 97% for children without additional needs.

LINK (2)