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Bangladesh has successfully reduced around 50% of child blindness in last the 14 years, which has come down to 25,000 from 48,000 as estimated in the year 2000.

Dr AHM Enayet Hussain, head of paediatric ophthalmology at the National Institute of Opthalmology and Hospital and program manager of national eye care program, made the announcement while presenting his keynote paper at an orientation on childhood blindness for journalist at the National Press Club yesterday.

Orbis International and Bangladesh Nari Sangbadik Kendra jointly organised the orientation under National Childhood Blindness Reduction Program at Orbis and the National Eye Care.

Presenting his keynote speech, Enayet said although no national survey was conduction on child blindness in the country, the World Health Organisation (WHO) estimated the number of child blindness patients using Under-5 child mortality rate.

Currently, the Under-5 child mortality rate is at 53, so it can be said that the estimated number of child blindness patients would be around 25,000, he added.

He also added: We had conducted cataract surgery of more than 10,000 children between 2005 and 2010. When we reviewed the success of these operations, we observed that many of the operation did not give satisfactory outcomes as the patient did not come for treatment at an earlier age.

He urged the people to bring their children, who are suffering from eyesight problem, for treatment and informed that the government will be providing all kinds of eye care treatment, including surgery, free of cost.

When asked, Dr Munir Ahmed, country director of Orbis International for Bangladesh, told the Dhaka Tribune: I will not disagree with him [Enayet] but before using this data it should be validated in some way.

However, the number of child blindness patients had definitely reduce in number. But, a large number of children continue to suffering from avoidable childhood illnesses.

He further said early detection of the problem, quality of treatment and post-treatment care can prevent avoidable blindness or restore the sight of the children.

Child eye experts said avoidable child blindness and visual impairment is a significant health issue in Bangladesh and its impact fuels poverty and worsens socio-economic inequality.

They also added that children of Bangladesh have been suffering of different eye related issues, such as cataract, refractive error, strabismus, rop (retinopathy of prematurity), ptosis and eye injury.

Quoting WHO, global estimates of childhood blindness show that the prevalence of childhood blindness in Bangladesh is at 0.75 per 1,000 children.

They said approximately 1.3 million children have refractive errors and around 1,53,600 have low vision problems, of which around 78,336 can be avoided.

Without intervention, blind or visually-impaired children are likely to experience low educational achievement, lack of productive employment opportunities, social isolation and increased poverty.

Among others, Mohammed Alauddin, director program of Orbis, Dr Nahid Ferdousi, co-ordinator of National Childhood Blindness Reduction Program, Dr. Lutful Husain, staff optholmologist at Orbis, and Parvin Sultana Jhuma, general secretary of Bangladesh Nari Sangbadhik Kendra, also addressed the program.

Read more:
Bangladesh successfully reduces child blindness over the last 14 years - Dhaka Tribune

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