VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. — Clay Dupilka wears hearing aids to help him at school and with interacting with other kids.
"My hearing aids help me play when there's a lot of noise," he said.
The 8-year-old has minor hearing loss in both ears due to bilateral hearing loss.
"When I don't have them in and my dad is far away or in the garage working on something and he calls me, I can't really hear him," he said.
When his parent first took him to get hearing aids, they realized insurance didn't cover hearing aids for children in Virginia.
His mom Crystal then began talking to lawmakers.
"It's very important for children to have access to hearing aids, so that they have the appropriate speech and language development at the milestones that they should reach them at," Crystal said.
Starting Jan. 1, insurance companies and other health providers must cover up to $1,500 per hearing-impaired ear to help children get hearing aids.
The General Assembly passed a bill mandating coverage earlier this year.
Clay traveled to Richmond to advocate for its passage.
"I think hearing aids are important so kids are able to hear in school," Clay told lawmakers in January.
A similar law passed in 2020 but ran into hang-ups with the budget, so this bill cleans up the issues.
It's one of several new laws that will take effect on Jan. 1, 2024, in Virginia. This year, the vast majority of bills took effect on July 1, but there are still some changes on the way for the new year.
Another helps make the adoption process for families more standardized between localities and agencies in what's called a home study.
"We believe that making the home study process transferable would make it possible for more prospective parents to begin their adoption journey by engaging in a wider range of placement organizations and that would make it possible for more children to find forever families," an adoptive father said during a hearing earlier this year.
The Dupilkas hope that their story will help others.
"I'm just really excited just to be able to say that we were able to do that for him and all of Virginia's children because it will really help with the schools and access," said Crystal.
