What to do if face masks are being worn in your child’s school

The National Deaf Children's Society offers advice in this video to British parents on the difficulties for deaf children attending schools where face coverings are used in classrooms or in communal areas.

UK TV personality: My Deaf Brother's "living hell"

British television personality Josie Gibson was emotional on the show This Morning as she talked about the difficulties faced by her deaf brother, Harry. She calls his experiences during the pandemic a "living hell." Gibson, who won the 11th season of Big Brother. points to the difficulty of being able to lip-read while people are using face masks. Ironically, the video does not have captions but here is part of what she said:

We are so privileged to be able to still communicate even though we wear a face mask. Imagine going into a shop and be totally cut off from everybody in that shop Not only do they use it - lip reading - to communicate, they use the whole bottom part as expression. They won't know if people are trying to talk to them, if people are trying to get their attention. They don't know how people are feeling - they wouldn't know the emotion of that person because they're just so cut off from that person. Everywhere, we're told wear mask, save lives, but we've forgotten about this community where these masks are making their lives a living hell.

Nursing and the Deaf community in the pandemic

The UK's Nursing Times posted an article about the particular concerns that need to be addressed when it comes to providing quality care for the Deaf community.  Tarnia Lefevre, a nurse working with the deaf, wrote:

It’s time we as professionals take a stand and say to the government to live by their own standards and laws. Let’s not make communication an afterthought – bring it to the forefront and remind ourselves why it is one of the six Cs (of nursing).

Read the entire post here.

Little girl greets deaf delivery driver in sign

A video has gone viral that shows eight-year-old Tallulah greeting deaf delivery driver in Greater Manchester, England. She used the sign language to surprise Tim Joseph. They had became friends and Tallulah drew a picture of a rainbow for the driver to thank him for his efforts amid the coronavirus pandemic. Joseph told the BBC, “Tallulah realized I was deaf and then one day she surprised me when she signed to me, ’Have a good day.’ I think she learnt sign language at school.” The video was taken by Tallulah's mother, Amy Roberts.

The lockdown's impact on deaf children in the UK

The Covid-19 pandemic has meant access to many support services is limited, and deaf youngsters are even more vulnerable, write a group of health and disability experts. Read more in the Guardian here.

Living through a pandemic without sound

There are 300,000 people in Northern Ireland affected by hearing loss. The BBC spoke to some of the about their experiences during the coronavirus outbreak here.

Implant Activated Remotely

A toddler in England has just had her cochlear implant activated for the first time during a remote telemedicine session between her house and the clinical team. Read more about it on Medgadget here or watch the video about the procedure below.

The UK prison system "fails" a deaf inmate

Tyrone Givans, who was profoundly deaf, killed himself while in a UK prison. His mother, Angela Augustin, told the Guardian, "Putting him in prison without hearing aids was like putting him in a hole in the ground." A jury found that "numerous systemic individual failures" led to his death. Read the entire story of what happened to Givans here.

The Deaf are being 'excluded from astronomy'

An astrophysicist in the UK is leading a project to develop 50 new BSL signs to help explain her research. Olja Panic says, "The deaf community risks being excluded from aspects of modern science because the number of new advances is outpacing the development of sign language to explain them." Read the full story at Phys.org here.

A first for a deaf person in the UK

Matthew Johnston is believed to be the first profoundly deaf person to sit on a jury in a crown court in England and Wales. He's a 54-year-old technology consultant from London. The Guardian quotes Johnston as saying, “It’s all about inclusivity, isn’t it. It’s a big thing for me. We don’t want to turn our backs to society, we want to be part of society. We want to feel included. I feel great that I can be one of a jury.” Read the full story about how the deaf have been kept out of jury rooms in the UK here.

BBC Tests New Audio Mix

The BBC is testing new technology that allows hard-of-hearing viewers to adjust audio levels in new ways. They can reduce background noise and make the dialogue crisper. Find out more about the technology on the BBC’s Taster website here.

Sainsbury’s turns store into signing supermarket

Sainsbury’s, one of the UK's largest supermarkets, turned one of its stores into a signing supermarket. It was renamed “Signsbury’s” for the three-day project. Read more about it here.

Brain implant surgery in the UK

A four-year-old boy in the UK had brain implant surgery recently. The BBC has a video report.

Study: Smoking exposure increases risk of deafness twofold

A Japanese study finds children are more than twice as likely to be born deaf if their mother smoked Even exposure to second-hand smoke increased the likelihood of hearing issues. Read more details in the Daily Mail here.

BSL teacher jailed, 'snared by paedophile hunter'

"A teacher once named 'Britain's sign language tutor of the year' has been jailed after being snared by a female paedophile hunter," reports the Daily Mail. Read the full story here.

The deaf six-year-old hoping for an Oscar

Profoundly deaf six year old Maisie Sly is the star of The Silent Child, a short film which could be vying for an Oscar. Find out more about it in this BBC video.

When a deaf singer gets death threats from other deaf people, something’s wrong

Freelance journalist Josh Salisbury makes a plea in the Guardian that deaf people "need to move beyond the oralism v sign language split." It was that divide, he tells readers, that has led to the social media backlash against America’s Got Talent finalist Mandy Harvey. Salisbury writes:

It also risks promoting a myth of a militant deaf community, acting as jealous gatekeepers of what it really means to be deaf. A casual observer reading the story about Harvey could be forgiven for thinking that the deaf community, in America or elsewhere, is far more intolerant than it really is.

Read the full story here.

The first deaf-led theatre company in the UK

Paula Garfield was frustrated with the barriers facing deaf actors. So she did something about it: Garfield started the first deaf-led theatre company in the UK. Fifteen years later, Deafinitely Theatre is still going strong. She writes:

Over the years I became disillusioned with the world of acting, and theatre more generally, having experienced a lack of deaf awareness and bullying from others in the industry. One year-long tour took a particular toll on me. As the only deaf member of the company I was ignored and poorly treated by my fellow actors and made to feel that, as a deaf person, I should be grateful I’d been offered the work in the first place.

Read her full story in the Independent here.

Deaf Man Refused Service at Restaurant

A London restaurant threw a deaf man out this past weekend because he had his service dog with him. The Gourmet Burger Kitchen franchise is now apoligizing. Read the story in The Mirror here.

Book breaks new ground

A new book and conference in the UK represent “a major leap forward for the discipline” of deaf studies. It's "the first volume to be written and edited entirely by deaf academics" about BSL, according to the Times Higher Education. Read more about the conference and the Oxford University Press book "Innovations in Deaf Studies: The Role of Deaf Scholars" here.