Earbuds and Hearing Loss

I’ve been lover of music since I was in elementary school and friends introduced me to the Beatles. By the time I got to high school in the 1970s one of my favorite music listening devices was my headphones. I could plug them into the family stereo system and crank up the music, leaving me to listen without complaints from my parents. Today, I love using my earbuds to listen to all kinds of music. But what I now wish I had known way back then was the damage that headphones and concerts can do to your ears. A recent study published in the British Medical Journal of Global Health reports that over billion people worldwide ages twelve to thirty-four could be at risk of noise-induced hearing loss. Researchers found that twenty four percent of young people enage in unsafe listening practices when using as ear buds. Parents, we are called by God to steward the physical health of our children. This includes protecting them from the harm of losing God’s good gift of hearing, now or in the future.