People registered as deaf or hard of hearing, England, March 2004

Main Category: Hearing / Deafness
Article Date: 19 Dec 2004 - 15:00 PDT


This Statistical Report provides information for England and individual Councils with Social Services Responsibilities (CSSRs) on the numbers of people registered with councils as deaf or hard of hearing at 31 March 2004. These statistics are collected and published every three years. The previous publication, containing information relating to 31 March 2001, was published in October 2001.

Registration of deafness by an individual is voluntary. This factor, combined with uncertainties about the regularity with which councils review and update their records, makes it difficult to assign a degree of reliability to these registers. Therefore, the numbers on the register should not be regarded as reliable indicators of the prevalence of deafness. Guidance was issued to councils to exclude people from this particular collection who are registered as deaf or hard of hearing and are also blind and recorded on the Register of the Blind.

Main Findings

" At 31 March 2004, 55 thousand people were on the register of deaf people.

" Between March 2001 and March 2004 the number on the register of deaf people increased by 4,700 (9%).

" At 31 March 2004, 159 thousand people were on the register of hard of hearing, an increase of around 14,400 (10%) since March 2001.

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Further information

Press enquiries should be made to:

Media Centre
Department of Health
Richmond House
79 Whitehall
London SW1A 2NS
020 7210 5221

For further details about the statistics in this report contact:

Kate Anderson/ Ann-Marie Brown
Statistics Division 3B
Room 451C
Department of Health
Skipton House
80 London Road
London SE1 6LH
Phone: 020 7972 5582/ 5588
Fax: 020 7972 5660
Email: Kate.Anderson@dh.gsi.gov.uk / Anne-Marie.Brown@dh.gsi.gov.uk

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