Bad eyesight problems, can't read ingredients and labels!

[JoCourtman]

To be honest this is quite an embarrassing issue for me as I'm not particularly old! But basically I am very severely longsighted and need reading glasses for most day to day tasks; including the writing and reading of shopping lists as well as physically reading the labels on food products.

This isn't always a problem as I don't suffer from any allergies and try to avoid rigid dieting most of the time. However there are a lot of people out there who do suffer from food allergies and poor eyesight and I think something could and should be done by the supermarkets on behalf of their consumers to rule out labelling issues. Whether it be a magnifier of some sort or adding an ingredients list to those barcode scanners, something should be done.

If I forget my glasses and need to check labels I am relatively unembarrassed to ask some nice lady to read out the ingredients for me but it is a pain in the backside. Not to mention the fact that the other day I asked a woman of maybe 40 to read the label on a couple of products as my cousin, who has a peanut allergy, was due to visit and she couldn't read the label either - we both had a bit of a laugh about our failing eyesight and then both agreed that some kind of backup system for food labels would be invaluable; especially in the current gastronomic climate with people obsessed with the contents of their food.

Is there any legislation that requires shops to cater for those with poor eyeight? Perhaps in the same way that the hearing loop system was introduced? I'd be interested to hear about anything on the horizon that could help to solve this problem.

Does anyone else have problems with food labels? If there are enough of us, perhaps we can go to TESCO and kick up a fuss!

[Chri55yBuchan]

You're not the only one who has issues with this sort of thing both myself and (quite embarrassingly) my mother, have the same issues. When we go out shopping together it's squint city with both of us holding tins of beans and condensed milk up to the light!

I don't know whether it's my responsibility or the supermarket but I do feel that I should be able to read everything that the shop wants me to buy; they wouldn't make the price miniscule on the label would they!?

I'm suprised noone has come back sooner than me but I'm certainly in support of anything that can be done to improve our rights (and sights!) in the supermarket!