Around 80% of blindness is avoidable (as in treatable or preventable); and 90% of blind people live in low income countries.

We are winning the war on blindness!

Looking into the dawn of a new decade towards 2020

But a lot of momentum has to keep building to increase efforts even further in the next 10 years to keep going until the job is done..

Thursday 14th is World Sight Day!  An international day of awareness to focus attention on the global issue of avoidable blindness and visual impairment.

80% of global blindness is avoidable.

4% of the World’s population are blind or severely visually impaired.  That’s four times the population of the UK!  It’s truly staggering, but we are also celebrating.  Yes there is a lot of need indeed, but we are winning the war on blindness.

It is incredible to think that CBM have with 102 years’ of disability and development experience and expertise performed over 10 million cataract operations.  And together with the WHO and the International Agency for the Prevention of Blindness, the burden of avoidable blindness is being tackled.  We need to carry on this work, and increase even more as we count down to 2020.

Mrs Samuel in her village before coming to hospital

Mrs Samuel back at home, a month after cataract surgery

But, it’s numbers.  Numbers that I can’t really get my head around.  What really counts to me, the staff at Nkhoma, and most importantly the patient… is that the 10 minutes, or even 6 minutes it takes for that cataract operation (and £20 donated by a kind supporter of CBM) will change that individuals life.  Forever.

New sight, New Life

Or as we say in Nkhoma…

Kuona kwa tsopano

Moyo wa tsopano

In line, waiting for surgery

Mrs Kadzichi back at home in the village

It takes me 7-10 minutes to do a cataract op.  It costs, in the general scheme of things, £20 for each op.  It doesn’t cost Mr Efuloni or Mrs Limon a penny.  Wow, they don’t work and have less than 50p to pay for the surgery!  It costs me nothing, it’s just my job, mime and the teams work.  The costs are for the staff salaries, medicines, surgical supplies.

I think the point of my ramblings are that for Mr Efuloni or Mrs Limon, that 10 minutes or that £20 will utterly have changed their lives.  Make no mistake.  Sitting here in the Western World for the next week before I return to Africa has kinda highlighted what we, all of us, do together at Nkhoma.  We send teams to reach out to far villages.  We screen the blind villagers who have been holed up in their huts for years, unable to function in their communities, as they once did.  We treat them with the respect and dignity that they deserve, and ultimately we restore their sight.

Yes, this is what we do.  Over 4,000 cataract operations, each year.  The staff at Nkhoma are amazing, an amazing team dedicated to their fellow people in helping them regain vision.

I am incredibly lucky to be a part of this.  But I will be very sad when I return to Malawi.  To have to tell the staff that we have to slow down.  We have to go in to fewer villages, and see fewer people, and do fewer operation; because the money is not there.  It kinda breaks my heart.

Finally, I can’t express my gratitude more strongly, than saying a huge thanks to all CBM donors for making it possible to do near 27,000 cataract operations in the past 10 years at Nkhoma.  We hope this year to push it to 30,000.  30,000 people who were blind, but now can see.  Village life with no electricity or water is hard enough; but if you cannot see the well, or your grandchildren; my guess is it’s a lot harder.

Thank you all, and all the very best for 2010

We’ll keep in touch

Will