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A leading hearing-loss group is urging politicians to put health warnings on MP3 players and place limits on the maximum volume they can reach.
In an impassioned plea to a select committee, the Hearing Association of New Zealand yesterday asked that hearing loss be added to the controversial new Public Health Bill, which allows for government regulation to combat non-communicable diseases like diabetes and cancer.
The bill currently ignores hearing loss and the association's public affairs manager, Chris Peters, said more needed to be done to prevent a problem that affected 400,000 New Zealanders.
If hearing loss was added into the bill, Mr Peters, said action such as imposing noise limits and putting health warnings on boxes should be taken.
"The issue is not just how loud you wear them, but how long you wear them," Mr Peters said of the MP3 players.
"When we were younger, we would listen to music on the radio or stereo for a period and then stop. With an MP3 player, you can use them for eight hours continuously and that sort of continuous hammering at your hearing is destroying it."
The select committee considering the new health legislation has received several submissions from organisations that want certain groupings to be added to the bill.
In its current form the bill gives the Cabinet wide powers to regulate to fight risk factors that contribute to non-communicable diseases.
Much of the debate about the legislation so far has been focused on the impact it could have on the advertising or sale of junk foods, but select committee chairwoman Sue Kedgley yesterday described the hearing loss submission as "fascinating" and said it had raised issues the committee hadn't thought about.
Noise limits are placed on MP3 players in France, where in 2002 Apple had to adjust some of the iPods it had on the market because they breached the 100dB limit set by the Government.
Mr Peters said New Zealand's personal stereos should also be calibrated to an acceptable level, probably one similar to the French limit.
"I think, more importantly, we should be looking at putting health warnings on these things, just the same as you do on cigarette packets," he said.
"People think you're a killjoy because you raise it - but get to the point when you can't use the phone, get to the point where you can't hear the microwave, where you can't hear the stove buzzer ... "
Mr Peters, who himself has suffered hearing loss, said people were not taking notice of information already available about the risks of MP3 players, so setting a noise level would get their attention.
"Then you can start to get the education message through as well."
The select committee considering the bill is due to report back to Parliament with its views on June 10.
