Braille still best tool for blind

More than 12,000 New Zealanders are either blind or sight-impaired but few have learned to read and write using Braille.

The literacy-through-Braille project manager for the Royal New Zealand Foundation for the Blind, Martine Abel, said only 360 of 12,600 sight-impaired New Zealanders used Braille.

The foundation today launches its annual appeal, which includes encouraging its members to use the reading aid.

Ms Abel said many people assumed that aids such as talking books, speech output computers and digital playback machines had removed the need for Braille, but although it was invented nearly 200 years ago, it was still the most practical tool in everyday instances.

She said Braille took about two months to learn with a weekly lesson.