Hey, MVNHS©: Can You Hear Me Now?

For those who continue to think that a nationalized health care scheme is the cat's meow, some bad news:

"HUNDREDS of parents do not realise their babies are deaf because they are not given hearing tests, it was revealed today."

Although such screening tests have been mandated for almost 2 years, "(t)he risks are that maybe 60-70 deaf children per year are missed and have reduced life chances," according to a recent report from the MVNHS©. In London alone, only a third of the systems' hospitals made their "quota" of screening at least 98% of all newborns. That means even more children may be at risk than previously thought.

And the National Deaf Children's Society is now calling for drastic and immediate action on the problem. One significant issue is that late diagnosis can hinder both treatment and the child's language and social development. They single out London area hospitals as the worst case examples: "only 72 cases of deafness in newborn babies was reported last year, against an expected 140." And it goes downhill from there, because even those children that are identified as at-risk often face lengthy delays in obtaining proper treatment.

Doesn't sound like such a great system to me.