TOI : India is home to world's largest number of blind people-15 million : Oct 12, 2007

India is home to world's largest number of blind people-15 million
Kounteya Sinha | TNN

New Delhi: India is now home to the world's largest number of blind people.
Of the 37 million people across the globe who are blind, over 15 million are
from India.

    What's worse, 75% of these are cases of avoidable blindness, thanks to
the country's acute shortage of optometrists and donated eyes for the
treatment of corneal blindness. While India needs 40,000 optometrists, it
has only 8,000. On the other hand, while India needs 2.5 lakh donated eyes
every year, the country's 109 eye banks (five in Delhi) manage to collect a
maximum of just 25,000 eyes, 30% of which can't be used.

    According to Ajeet Bhardwaj, outgoing president of the Asia Pacific
Optometrists Organisation, India has 12,000 ophthalmologists who have no
time to conduct blindness-preventing surgeries because they are flooded with
general eye check-up of patients.

    "For India, it is vital that ophthalmologists focus on surgeries and
optometrists take charge of primary eye care refractive errors like
presbyopia, contact lenses, low-vision aids and vision therapies. This is
how most developed countries managed to control and eliminate avoidable
blindness," Bhardwaj says. Bhardwaj says 153 million people in the country
require reading glasses but do not have access to them.

    Optometrists are eye physicians concerned with vision care, eye diseases
and prescribe eyeglasses, contact lenses and medications to treat eye
disorders. An ophthalmologist specialises in surgical care of the eyes.

    India has just 20 optometry schools which produce just 1,000
optometrists annually as against the 17 million people being added to the
population during the same period. There is a shortage of faculty as well.
There are also no regulatory laws to control the practice of optometry even
though refractive error is one of the leading causes of blindness.

    There is, therefore, no recognition, making Indian optometrists migrate
to foreign shores. Optometry is among one of the best 10 professions in US
and UK. Ophthalmologist Dr J S Titiyal, specialising in cornea and
refractive surgery at AIIMS, agrees.

    "More well trained professional optometrists will immensely help India
as it will give us time to concentrate on surgery, our primary
specialisation. Anyway India has just one eye surgeon per 100,000 people. At
present, patients come to us even for eye power check-up. The government
also needs to standardise optometric education to maintain quality," he
says.

    Meanwhile, shortage of donated eyes is becoming a huge problem. Of the
15 million blind people in India, three million, 26% of whom are children,
suffer due to corneal disorders. But only 10,000 corneal transplants are
being done every year due to the shortage of donated eyes. The Union health
ministry has already launched a national programme to control blindness and
expects to reach its blindness elimination target of 0.3% by 2015, five
years before the WHO deadline of 2020.

Long hours at

comp leading

to eye ailments

New Delhi: Do you suffer from frequent headaches, dry eyes, double vision
and neck and shoulder pain? Do you face difficulty in focusing on your
computer screen? Have your eyes become sensitive to light? You could be
suffering from Computer Vision Syndrome (CVS). Even though it was first
identified in the early 90s, the number of CVS cases has shot up in India
only now, thanks to excessive use of electronic gadgets with tiny screens.

    According to ophthalmologists, over 85% of those exposed to computers
and blackberrys for over six hours a day suffer from CVS. According to
doctors, tiny screens that fade out in bright sunlight accelerate the onset
of CVS.

    According to Rohit Shetty, a cornea and refractive surgeon from Narayana
Netralaya, Bangalore, CVS is fast becoming a silent epidemic, the most
important reason for which is the reduction of the blink rate of 16/min to
about its 1/3. This leads to irritation, dryness, excessive tearing,
burning, itching and redness.

    Shetty prescribes blinking, closing eyelids and rolling eyes frequently
whenever one begins to sense eye discomfort. "The computer screen should be
four to eight inches below the eyes. Optimum viewing distance is considered
to be 20-28 inches. One must not be seated near an air vent and eliminate
the flow of air past your eyes. The size of the text should be three times
the size of the smallest text you can read. Alter the workstation position
so that bright overhead lights or bright windows are not in your field of
vision," Dr Shetty said.

    "Every 20 minutes, take a 20-second break and focus on something 20 feet
away," another opthalmologist said. Doctors also say positioning of the
monitor should be in front of the chest but not at the eye level. Brightness
should be moderate, not dull and a slight tilt of the screen is recommended.

EYE OPENER

India needs 40,000 optometrists, has 8,000 Blindness prevalence in India is
a little above 1.1% with cataracts being the main reason for sight loss
Rural India accounts for 80% of the country's blind population In India, a
child goes blind every four minutes More than 3,20,000 children in India
suffer from avoidable blindness

Publication:Times Of India Mumbai; Date:Oct 12, 2007; Section:Times Nation;
Page Number:18

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