Thursday, July 3, 2008

Why "Medical Intervention" Enclosed in EDHI Bill And Seen Deaf Babies as "Birth Defect"

You ought to examine the "Early Hearing Detection & Intervention Program" H.R. 1198 legislation passage closely what it really meant by "medical intervention for children with hearing loss" and "appropriate programs".

The EDHI bill also mention "treatment of hearing loss" and see deaf babies as "birth defect"

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bquery for the text of legislation - S 1712 and look for Hillary Clinton as a sponsor of S 1712 bill - Early Hearing Detection and Intervention Program.

http://walsh.house.gov/list/press/ny25_walsh/pr_080408.html , Jim Walsh, Congressman

The incoming S 1712 Senate bill did not mention anything about the emphasis of ASL and bilingualism as a real necessity for language development and academic successes, etc.

Let's look at the American Speech Language Hearing Association (ASLHA) website for the list of "Early Hearing Detection & Intervention Action Center -

http://www.asha.org for State Information, ASHA Resources, Other Resources

for State Laws, Find Your State EDHI Contact, ASHA's Resource Guide for Educational and
Pediatric and "Can Your Baby Hear?"...

What is the National Center on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders really doing to us, deaf people so far? Why it largely focus on the pathological aspects of deafness?

Are deaf people being slowly exterminated in name of science and human perfection?

The U.S. government once took the Native Americans' own identity and deny them to speak their native language, then cut off their long hairs and Anglicized their names in name of Americanization.

That could happen to us, deaf people which the Jews and other undesirables dismissed the possibility of systematic extermination and re-education programs in Nazi Germany until too late for them.

Our U.S. Government hardly bother to acknowledge our rich cultural and linguistic hertiage of deaf people and its contributions to the United States.

ASlize yours,
Robert L. Mason
RLMDEAF blog