The radio earpiece has a design feature that makes it unusually risky for your hearing. Most police officers wear it in a single ear, and the Airwave and TETRA radio sets used across UK policing, including Police Scotland, can produce high sound levels. Because the earpiece has to compete with noisy streets, crowds and vehicles, officers routinely turn the volume up just to make out what is being said. The result is a form of noise-induced hearing loss, driven not by a single loud bang but by repeated excessive noise exposure over years.
Research from the University of Manchester, published in the journal Trends in Hearing in early 2026 and funded mainly by the Medical Research Council, measured this for the first time. From a survey of 4,498 police personnel, the researchers found that around 45% of earpiece users reported temporary hearing symptoms, such as ringing or muffled hearing, in the exposed ear after a shift. Those symptoms were more common among officers who used higher volume settings. For most users, estimated noise exposure exceeded the UK legal action level of 85 decibels, the point at which employers are expected to act.
Why is this only surfacing now?
It is a fair question. If this has been happening for years, why is it only being discussed now? Part of the answer is timing. The Airwave system was introduced in the early 2000s, so for many officers the years of exposure have only recently added up to something noticeable. There has also been a more recent shift. As body-worn video has become standard, officers are encouraged to use earpieces in public so that radio audio is not recorded and later redacted before court, and earpiece use has intensified as a result.
One point is worth clearing up. You may already associate police hearing loss with firearms training or public order policing. Earpiece injury is different: it affects one ear and builds gradually over years of ordinary duties. If that describes you, the same research and the same legal principles apply.
Why this is not just age-related hearing loss
This is the part that matters most, because it answers the doubt most people arrive with: isn’t this just my age?
The Manchester study was built around a useful feature of earpiece use. Because the earpiece sits in only one ear, researchers could compare each officer’s exposed ear with their other ear. Both ears belong to the same person, of the same age, health and lifestyle, so the unexposed ear acts as a natural control. Anything that shows up in the earpiece ear but not the other cannot easily be blamed on age.
They found that tinnitus was strongly concentrated in the ear that wore the earpiece. Earpiece use was linked to a 73% increase in the risk of prolonged, spontaneous tinnitus, and diagnosed hearing loss followed a similar pattern. Age-related hearing loss affects both ears fairly evenly. One-sided, or asymmetric, damage points somewhere else.
A second finding points the same way. The Police National Hearing Survey found hearing loss disproportionately among officers aged 25 to 44, far younger than age-related loss would normally appear. Age affects both ears and arrives later in life. Earpiece damage is one-sided and shows up early. Together, the two findings give the “isn’t it just my age?” question a clear, evidence-backed answer.
Any claim of this kind rests on a straightforward principle. Employers carry a legal responsibility, known as a duty of care, to assess noise levels and take reasonable steps to protect their staff’s hearing. In many workplaces that means providing adequate hearing protection. With a radio earpiece the situation is different, because the device meant to help you do your job is itself the source of the noise, so the duty does not disappear simply because the earpiece is essential kit.
Hearing assessments have also been applied inconsistently from force to force, and police representative bodies have publicly raised concerns about prolonged earpiece use, high volume levels and the lack of consistent monitoring.
It is also worth naming what stops many officers before they start. Claiming can feel disloyal, as though you are turning on the job or your colleagues. You are not. A claim is a legal right. It is directed at the institution and its insurers, not the people you work alongside, and it does not have to damage your working relationships.
