Global blindness - a preventable tragedy

Every 5 seconds a person in the world goes blind and a child goes blind every minute.

Over the next decade the need for effective blindness prevention and treatment programs will become an increasingly urgent problem on a global level.

The number of people in need is growing far more rapidly than the eye care services to help them. It is commonly estimated that without proper interventions, the number of blind people in the world will increase from 45 million today to 75 million by 2020. At present, another 135 million have debilitating low vision.

Ninety percent of the world’s blind people live in developing countries. This is a preventable tragedy.

The good news is that three-quarters of global blindness is treatable or preventable. Half of the world’s blindness is caused by cataract which is reversible with a 15-minute operation costing about $50 in most developing countries.

Treatments available for the prevention and cure of blindness are among the most successful and cost-effective of all healthcare interventions through charging affordable patient fees and the integration of the sale of optical services.

Eye care has a unique potential among health services in developing countries to become financially sustainable.

Gender and blindness

Two out of three blind people in the world are women, yet they are the least likely to obtain sight restoring services. This disparity is even more pronounced between girls and boys.

Seva Canada has taken explicit leadership in the gender and blindness global initiative. All Seva-led projects work towards achieving gender equity by focusing on overcoming traditional barriers to women's and girls' access. The barriers that prevent women and girls from receiving surgery vary locally and can include:

• cost of surgery
• inability to travel to a surgical facility
• differences in the perceived value of surgery
• lack of access to information and resources
• fear of a poor outcome

Awareness of the problem is not enough. Political will and social action are needed to address gender inequities in use of eye care services. It is our belief that in order to achieve the goals of VISION 2020, gender inequities in eye care must be a priority for all organizations.

   To read more
   about the important issue of gender and blindness,
   download Seva's booklet,
   Gender and Blindness: Initiatives to address inequity.

Community Ophthalmology

Seva Canada is part of  VISION 2020's initiative that aims to eliminate avoidable
blindness by the year 2020. Is this goal realistic?

It probably is, in theory; the technical knowledge exists to do away with blindness and visual impairment from the number one avoidable cause, which is cataract. Cataract surgery can even be provided relatively cheaply – so why is it still the main cause of blindness in most poor countries?

In the answer to that question, lies much of the substance of  “community ophthalmology.” It’s often hard for people from industrialized countries to understand, but people with cataract don’t always know that: (1) something can be done about the condition, or (2) where to go to get something done. It can seem overwhelming.

Even if they get the needed information, they may be afraid of the surgery, have no experience with travel outside their village, or have little support from family to undertake the operation. These “barriers” mean that patients stay home with poor vision while
doctors in eye departments—sometimes well equipped and supplied eye departments—are often not working at full capacity.

All of Seva's programs concentrate on community ophthalmology, that is putting in place programs to bridge the community with the services and improve efficiency at the
hospital.