Eye care resources not properly used

By Ranil Wijayapala

Sri Lanka should have a mechanism for the proper use of funds made available by the Government and various other organisations for eye care. The resources available are not properly used for the benefit of the people in need of eye care, Eye Care Optometric Association sources said last week.

Addressing the media in Colombo, Consultant Optometrist Naresh Pradhan, said though millions of rupees flow into the country through various organisations and fund raising campaigns by various Non Government Organisation the funds are not properly used for the benefit of the people.

"By distributing spectacles alone cannot solve problems related to eye diseases.

We realised that less than five percent of the population understand regular eye examination and about eye diseases," Pradhan said.

He said that more than 100 organisations are working for the visual welfare of the country and are all serving the same purpose -- vision and all of them conduct eye camps.

"Millions of rupees are spent collectively. Constructively we can make things better. Resources that we have is sufficient for this and what we need is a proper plan and system," he said.

He said almost half of the Sri Lankan population cannot afford eye care services as they receive an income of less than Rs. 300 per day and due to the long distance they have to travel for eye care services.

"Even at government institutions providing free cataract surgery, people have to purchase lenses and other requirements, which is expensive. But most of these people afford them under difficult circumstances but people who cannot afford become blind," Pradhan said.

"If we take Sri Lanka we have only one full-fledged eye hospital for a population of 22 million and almost every district has only one eye unit with one eye surgeon and two opthalmic technologists.

This has made people insecure regarding eye care," he said.

He said according to their estimates more than 150,000 in the country are completely blind and cannot be given vision by any surgery, medicine or spectacles.

"We understand if people are more aware about eye we can prevent blindness among the Sri Lankan population," Pradhan said.

The Eye Care Optometric Association's Eye Care 2014 at the BMICH and Cinnamon Lakeside under the theme Age of Synergy for Change with a collective effort of 17 organisations, ends tomorrow.

"We will get the participation of all kinds of visual welfare stakeholders and have national agenda on eye care organisations and their role, children visual impairment, standard of education on vision science and road map for optical industry," he said.

The students who have completed the courses at the Eye Care Institute were awarded certificates yesterday at the BMICH.

Deputy Health Minister Lalith Dissanayake, Chairman of the Eye Care Optometric Association, Optometrist, G.R.L . Gamlath, Secretary, Optometrist Prabamali Siriwardana and Treasurer, Optometrist Suranga de Silva were also present.