subject: US Personnel Face Permanent Loss of Hearing [print this page] US Personnel Face Permanent Loss of Hearing
Lately, the military has been compelled to intensify its efforts to guard the troops from noise as it has been a plaguing actuality that soldiers and Marines caught in roadside bombings and firefights in Iraq and Afghanistan are coming back home in huge numbers with ringing in their ears or even permanent loss of hearing which is a sad fate. Some experts declare that hearing injury is the first disability in the war on terror to the Department of Veterans Affairs, and sadly it might take so many decades before the true ramifications are defined. Practically 70,000 of the more than one million three hundred thousand more or less troops who have served in the two war zones are collecting disability for tinnitus, a potentially incapacitating ringing in the ears, and 58,000 are on disability for hearing loss as well, sadly. These very discoveries are so astounding. It has been explained that the pentagon never anticipated the rebel's use of a powerful and threatening weapon, the roadside bombs and this is one of the major explanations. Their blasts cause violent changes in air pressure that can rupture the eardrum and break bones inside the ear.
Additionally, a lot of the battle schemes would include ambushes, firefights and bombings all of which are unexpected so the fighters do not have time to put on the hearing protection gear given by the military services. Wait a minute, I got to put my ear protection first, is something they cannot do. Additionally, some servicemen on patrol refuse to wear their assigned earplugs for fear of dulling their sense of hearing inevitably missing important sounds that truly matter. Others might have forgotten to take their earplugs along or were simply not given a pair before they were sent into the war district.
Even if four long years have passed since the simultaneous eruption of three roadside bombs near Baghdad transpired, a former serviceman recalls how the sounds of war persist in his ears. When the bomb went off, he shares how he didn't feel his leg gone and it was quite absurd that all he could remember vividly was the intense ringing in his ears. It was back in the year 2003 when this man's leg got blown off, leaving only his knee. He discloses the sad fact that up until today, his ears would be ringing even as he already has a nice new prosthetic leg.
As per the military audiology reports, forty nine percent of US personnel exposed to blasts suffer from tinnitus and sixty percent of them would suffer from hearing loss on a permanent degree. Mild hearing damage would comprise of the failure to hear whispers or low pitches, up to severe conditions including total deafness or a steady loud ringing that destroys the ability to focus in an individual, and these are the degrees of the hearing loss. There is no known cure for tinnitus or hearing loss.
Hearing loss is the leading disability since the time of World War II even up to the Vietnam War. However, it is a fact, according to the figures released by the VA, that despite everything that has been learned over the years, the Army troops are suffering hearing damage at about the rate as veterans from World War II. The war waged in Iraq is not in any comparison to the Second World War. The Second World War was a different kind of war, unleashed to a far greater extent by way of cosmic artillery barrages, terror campaigns and tank battles which were like epics.
With the kind of fearsome weaponry today, even the best hearing protectors is only effective partially and only if it is administered properly. A pair of $7.40 worth double sided earplugs, with one facet designed to protect from weapons fire and explosions, while the other from aircraft and tank noise were distributed to some members of the Marines. But the Marines were not given instructions in how to use the earplugs, and some cut them in half, while others used the wrong sides, making the devices virtually useless. Manuals for the earplugs are handed out together with the latter.
The Navy and Marines have begun buying and distributing state of the art earplugs that contain digital processors that block out damaging sound waves from gunshots and explosions and still allow users to hear everyday noises. Those dispatched to Afghanistan and Iraq are protected with recently developed one sided earplugs that cost about eight dollars and fifty cents and it has begun testing it with some soldiers.
Additionally, the Navy is working with San Diego based firm that is developing a hearing pill that would protect the hearing of their men. Permanent hearing loss had a reduction of 25 to 27 percent as seen in an early study in 2003 on 566 recruits. To finish, we now see that American warfare for the first time in the past 3 years have assigned hearing specialists or hearing trained medics on its front lines instead of just in the outlying first aid sites or clinics.
