Guest: Dr Caitlin Frisby - Postdoctoral Researcher and Audiologist at The Department of Speech-Language Pathology and Audiology at UP

In Africa, an estimated 136 million people are currently living with hearing loss, a figure expected to swell to 337 million by 2050.  This silent epidemic has profound social and economic repercussions contributing to a global cost of untreated hearing loss estimated at US$980 billion annually.

 In Africa it is exacerbated by a dire shortage of audiologists, with fewer than one for every million people, and the prohibitive costs of hearing aids for many in low- to middle-income countries. Only 2% of those who need hearing aids in Africa wear them. It is for this reason a University of Pretoria professor of audiology in collaboration with the World Health Organisation and the hearX Foundation are Revolutionising access to hearing care by pioneering community-based hearing care initiatives in low-income communities in Kenya, as well as Khayelitsha, Gugulethu, Mbekweni, Atteridgeville and the Eastern Cape province in South Africa.