Dear New York State Senators, Could You Please Repeat That?

This letter, by Casey Goldstein, 17, of Byram Hills High School in Armonk, N.Y., is one of the Top 9 winners of The Learning Network’s Student Open Letter Contest, for which we received 8,065 entries. You can find the work of all the winners, as we publish them, here.

Dear New York State Senators,

Let me make myself clear that I did not want hearing aids. “Social suicide,” as my sister described it. Arriving at school with new glasses hails compliments from friends or teachers, but when you come to school with new hearing aids, the best compliment is none. You hope no one notices them and even grow out your hair for full coverage.

When I found out that I needed hearing aids during my junior year of high school, I simply refused. But, in the following weeks, I began to notice how many times I said “What?” in conversations, how many frustrated friends stared back at me for interrupting the story yet again. I became aware of the missed lunchtime drama that unfolded in muted discourse around me as I retreated inside my head with only pieces of conversations I understood. I was excluded, a non-participatory, lonely friend adapting to a fragmented life. I became aware that hearing aids were no longer an option I could refuse.

That’s when I learned that to most insurance companies, hearing aids are an option they can refuse, and they do. The same device with the power to reorganize brain pathways that have been altered due to hearing loss is deemed as not medically necessary, considered equal to cosmetic surgeries. No state mandates in New York require non-Medicaid insurance support for hearing aids. Why, then, are there over 25 other states that mandate specific coverage for hearing aids, whether for a certain age or amount of coverage, while New York has nothing?

There was a glimmer of hope on Oct. 17, 2022, when the F.D.A. introduced cheaper over-the-counter hearing aids, yet they were not made for children and are even potentially harmful to them. That means, currently, anyone under the age of 18 living in New York has no other option; their family needs to muster up thousands of dollars for hearing aids, or they try to get through their 18 years without the device essential for learning and development.

There is currently a bill in the New York State Senate Committee that “requires all insurance policies to provide coverage for medically necessary hearing aids for children less than 18 years of age.” I implore you, as a child who has experienced firsthand the transformative power of hearing aids, that you support this bill and its respective fight unequivocally. In a world full of high social anxiety, there is no reason why any child should feel further socially isolated or inferior in intelligence simply because they are denied the fundamental right to hear. I was there, and hearing aids changed my life. Now, I ask that you let them change the lives of all the others.

Sincerely,
Casey Goldstein