Sonomax Hearing Healthcare is one of my favorite companies because it's so good at marketing. Not only has it turned the lowest of low-tech products, the common earplug, into a high-tech wonder, but it also has a real knack for hitching its story to legitimate news events. I especially like the Canadian company's latest announcement of a deal with Audi-Lab Ear Protection of Dublin this week for distribution of its Sonomax Solution electronic earplug system throughout The Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. By tying its announcement to the European Union's Stop That Noise! campaign, which will be the centerpiece of the EU's annual European Week for Health and Safety at Work in October, it has prodded every other country in Europe to get on the earplug bandwagon or face the wrath of EU regulators. With the World Health Organization declaring noise-induced hearing loss as one of the world's most prevalent, irreversible industrial diseases, the EU has passed strict new regulations requiring employers to quiet down their workplaces or face stiff penalties. The EU notes that noise pollution is endemic at work, "from factories to farms, call centres to concert halls," and that fully one third of employees in Europe currently are exposed to potentially dangerous levels of noise for at least a quarter of their time at work.
Because noise-induced hearing loss is a completely preventable condition, Sonomax's story is compelling. Plugging your ears is the only way to prevent hearing loss, but normal earplugs make it impossible to hear at work as well as many need to. Sonomax solves that problem with a special system that dampens environmental noise while still enabling workers to hear and communicate with each other at work at normal decibal levels. I wonder if the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health and Administration (OSHA) will get on the earplug bandwagon before it rolls out of town. Right now, the U.S. regulations appear a lot less strict than in Europe.
Posted by David at 02:15 AM on Jul 20, 2005 in ISSUES & ADVOCACY
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