Restoring sight of a child is an investment

Noor Jahan's father Rajab Ali, a resident of Chhoto Maharajpur village in Sirajganj district, is a day labourer. Noor lost her eye sight due to typhoid at the age of three. Noor had huge problem in communication, cognition and performing her activities. It was difficult for her to move around the community even at her home. Family members of Noor were also stigmatized. Noor has never been to school but she's eager to study. Her mother and father want her to be able to be independent and do her own work by herself.

After detecting her, Child Sight Foundation (CSF) started working with her to provide home-based rehabilitation.

There are many visually impaired children who face trouble due to lack of proper rehabilitation and services.    

The impact of child blindness extends from the individual to the family, the community, and the nation. The physical, social, educational, and economic consequences can be devastating if not addressed. Blindness and visual impairment have an enormous personal, social and economic cost, considerably limiting individuals' educational and life choices, and placing a heavy burden on families, communities, and health care services.

Lost opportunities associated with blindness and visual impairment lead to emotional stress and economic hardship. Blind children and those with limited sight experience social isolation, low self-esteem, lack of independence, and lost educational and economic opportunities. Lack of eye care can have a severe economic impact by perpetuating poverty or pushing a family into poverty.

Adult blindness also results in lost opportunities for children.

According to USAID, "Blindness and low vision may lead to a reduction of 0.5 per cent of GDP in parts of Africa and Asia by 2020. Nearly a third of the global economic cost of blindness is due to child blindness. Time spent caring for the blind, money spent on treatment, and lost earnings reduce family income and productivity and their potential contribution to the nation's economic development. Effective and low-cost solutions exist to eradicate avoidable blindness. Preventive interventions and early detection and treatment of problems can dramatically reduce the incidence of child blindness".

Interventions that prevent child blindness can also prevent death and illness. Improving vitamin A status reduces the risk of blindness, reduces child deaths by an average of 23 per cent, and increases resistance to infections. Treating trachoma in children can improve their quality of life and decrease the risk of blinding complications in adulthood. Controlling river blindness can prevent a disease that disrupts children's education and turns children into caregivers of parents and elderly relatives blinded by the disease.

"Restoring the sight of a child is an investment that benefits the individual as well as the family and community. Globally, the eradication of avoidable child and adult blindness would result in an estimated savings of $ 102 billion", said USAID.

In Bangladesh, most of the eye care institutions and facilities are not equipped with appropriate human resources, diagnostic and surgical equipment or laboratory facilities. Ophthalmologists work primarily in the urban centres and there is an inadequate number of skilled eye care professionals within the country.

According to Disability Rights Watch Group (Bangladesh), the state of our present rehabilitation infrastructure remains weak, especially at the community level. This implies that the current rehabilitation infrastructure is ill-equipped to meet the needs of majority of people with disabilities in the country, most of whom not only live in rural areas, but who are also unlikely to have sufficient resources to gain access to even basic rehabilitation services.  

Persons with disabilities are often overlooked in situations of humanitarian emergencies, both man-made as well as natural catastrophes. They suffer most in natural disasters and other disasters and human-made disasters.

The World Sight Day, an annual day of awareness to focus global attention on blindness, visual impairment and rehabilitation of the visually impaired, is held on the second Thursday in October every year.

According to World Health Organization (WHO), the Day is also the main advocacy event for the prevention of blindness and for "Vision 2020: The Right to Sight", a global effort to prevent blindness created by WHO and the International Agency for the Prevention of Blindness (IAPB).

The objectives of the World Sight Day are to raise public awareness of blindness and vision impairment as major international public health issues, to influence governments, particularly health ministers, to participate in and designate funds for national blindness prevention programs.

It is also aimed at educating target audiences about blindness prevention, about VISION 2020 and its activities, and to generate support for VISION 2020 program activities.

VISION 2020 is a global initiative that aims to eliminate avoidable blindness by the year 2020. It was launched on February 18, 1999 by the WHO together with the more than 20 international non-governmental organisations involved in eye care and prevention and management of blindness that comprise the IAPB.

The VISION 2020 objectives are to: increase awareness - among key audiences - of the causes of avoidable blindness and the solutions that could help eliminate the problem; identify and secure the necessary resources around the world in order to provide an increased level of activity in prevention, treatment and rehabilitation programmes; and facilitate the planning, development, and implementation of the three elements of the VISION 2020 strategic plan by national programmes.

In November, 2000, the Bangladesh government ratified the global initiative of Vision 2020. In order to implement its objectives, the government took up an operational plan titled 'National Eye Care' and started work for its implementation.      

Although Bangladesh enjoyed a unique status of being first among few countries to ratify Vision 2020, mentionable progress towards establishing a process for achieving Vision 2020 goals is yet to be visible.   

The Bangladesh National Vision 2020 program was launched in November 2000, signalling the country's commitment to accelerate programs to help control preventable blindness. At that time, Dr Hardjotanojo, the WHO representative to Bangladesh, said that preventable blindness costs Bangladesh $ 480 million in care and treatment hours, whereas the cost of prevention is a mere fraction of this.

CSF said, "If we want to implement the National Eye Care plan, the vacant posts of eye physicians at upazila and district levels should be filled up, operation theatre for eyes at district and equivalent level hospitals should be installed. Steps are needed to expand the standard of services at primary and secondary level service providing centres and improving the quality of services, strengthening the activities of Vision 2020 at district level in order to expand the scope of services and enhancing coordination and cooperation among eye-health service providing institutions".

The disabled people should be allowed to participate in different social, cultural, sports and other activities along with others to create a sense of inclusion, which will help raise awareness about establishment of their rights.  

CSF said we should provide access to home-based rehabilitation, education and proper treatment to children with disabilities. To achieve this, the disabled children must be identified first.

Mass media should play a due role to create mass awareness about the causes of blindness and other eye-related problems and highlight the rights of the disabled people for ensuring a rights-based better society. We should empower children with disabilities, their families and community members.

The Constitution of Bangladesh (Article 27) mandates that all citizens are equal before law and entitled to equal protection of law. Article 19 states that the State shall endeavour to ensure equality of opportunities to all citizens.

The writer is a journalist. Email: [email protected]