Exclusive Anne Bruce The Co-operative Group has become the first retailer in the country to put Braille descriptions on packs of own label medicines and vitamins. The society has taken two years to crack the technology for embossing cardboard cartons or plastic labels with Braille. Packs specifying the name, the product and its strength, if applicable, will be on sale from next week. The descriptions will be included on products ranging from the Co-op's analgesic cartons and vitamin tablet labels to packs of plasters. The idea could even be rolled out into other ranges. Braille symbols are currrently used only on bleach bottles in the UK. However, the society says that with one million blind and partially sighted people in this country, other manufacturers and retailers should follow its lead and extend the use of Braille labelling. "They will help blind and partially sighted people to differentiate between products in the home environment, so they are less reliant on other people to identify the correct medicine," a spokesman said. David Blunkett, education secretary, Colin Low, chairman of the Royal National Institute for the Blind, and Lord Morris of Manchester, who was Britain's first minister for the disabled, will launch the initiative at the Co-op's Stepney Welcome store on Tuesday. {{NEWS }}

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