By Rose B. Palacio

Davao City (20 December) -- Eighty percent of deafness is preventable. However, the lack of knowledge on proper ear care, and inadequate ear and hearing facilities, especially in farflung areas, have proven to be a big hindrance to fight deafness, said Dr. Luchie Aportadera of the Maharlika Charity Foundation.

As one of the advocates in enhancing the development of Persons with Disabilities, Dr. Aportadera was one of the guests during the recently-concluded 5th commencement exercise of PWD graduates held at Lispher Inn.

The Rotary Club of Matina have established a Rotary Foundation Computer Skills Training Center for the Differently-abled Persons with the purpose of enhancing computer literacy for PWDs and be able to find a job.

Deaf and blind students were also part of the graduating class with Professor Engr. Darlito Palermo as their computer instructor.

Aportadera said majority of the hearing impaired cases are caused by Impacted Cerumen, Otitis Media, and other infectious diseases.

There are about eight agencies in Davao City involved in combating deafness and hearing impairment, records at the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) showed.

These agencies and the DSWD have been in close coordination with each other to provide better service delivery and referral system for the deaf persons.

In the year 2000, of the country's population of about 78 million, 33 million are children or 45% of the population in which an estimated 1.4 million have some form of hearing impairment.

Last year, a study conducted by the experts in the University of Sto. Tomas showed that 28.1% of Filipinos have hearing problems, and 8.8% have hearing disability.

Doctor Aportadera lauded the RC Matina for having a Computer Skills training center for PWDs and even provided a big space at Lispher Inn to house said training center.