§ Mr. AshleyTo ask the Secretary of State for Health how many (i) deaf-blind adults and (ii) deaf-blind children there are in Britain; and how long it is since the last survey was made.
§ Mr. FreemanThe numbers of adults and children in England who were registered with local authorities as blind with an additional handicap of deafness are recorded in "Registered Blind and Partially Sighted Persons at 31 March 1986—England". A copy of this publication is in the Library. The most recent collection of these statistics related to 31 March 1988 and will be published in due course.
Registration of disability is a voluntary process. The numbers of deaf-blind adults and children in the population are believed to be considerably greater than the numbers who register but no reliable estimate is available.