World Sight Day is an annual day of awareness, to focus global attention on blindness and vision impairment.

This year’s call to action theme is: No More Avoidable Blindness

Staff of  International Centre for Eye Health (ICEH) and International Centre for Evidence in Disability (ICED) as well as students from the MSc Public Health for Eye Care celebrated World Sight Day by presenting their work in research, teaching and will also offer an interactive display where guests will have the opportunity to witness what it would be like to have a visual impairment with the use of simulation spectacles.

• Raise public awareness of blindness & vision impairment as major international public health issues
• Influence Governments/Ministers of Health to participate in and designate funds for national blindness prevention programmes
• Educate target audiences about blindness prevention,  about VISION 2020 and to generate support for VISION 2020 programme activities

International Key Messages

• Approximately 285 million people worldwide live with low vision and blindness
• Of these, 39 million people are blind and 246 million have moderate or severe visual impairment
• 90% of blind people live in low-income countries
• Yet 80% of visual impairment is avoidable – i.e. readily treatable and/or preventable
• Restorations of sight, and blindness prevention strategies are among the most cost-effective interventions in health care
• The number of people blind from infectious causes has greatly reduced in the past 20 years
• An estimated 19 million children are visually impaired
• About 65 % of all people who are visually impaired are aged 50 and older, while this age group comprises only 20% of the world’s population
• Increasing elderly populations in many countries mean that more people will be at risk of age-related visual impairment.

Below: MSc Public Health for Eye Care Student, Nnenne Onu blind folded to signify what it would be like to be completely blind and relying on her sense of touch.

Below: MSc Public Health for Eye Care student, Jacqueline Jetton-O’Banion, talking to guests about blinding eye diseases. Here, a participant put on a simulation spectacle that represents a blinding eye disease.

For more photos: View and add more here.