Joining forces for the love of eyes

September 10, 2021 Susanne Bradley

The umbrella group for New Zealand’s eye health organisations, Eye Health Aotearoa (EHA) has partnered with the International Agency for the Prevention for Blindness (IAPB) to help raise awareness and advocate for equitable and accessible eye health.

 

“It means a lot for EHA to have IAPB, the overarching alliance for the global eyecare sector, behind our efforts to improve New Zealanders’ access to quality and equitable eye health services,” said EHA secretary Dianne Rogers, general manager policy and advocacy at Blind Low Vision NZ.

 

BLVNZ's Dianne Rogers

 

New data shows that over one billion people suffer from preventable vision loss, Rogers said. “Now is a critical moment for EHA and IAPB to act together. By partnering with the IAPB, EHA is adding our collective voice to a powerful, unprecedented alliance for better eye health for all.”

 

Partnering with IAPB also means that EHA can support and contribute towards global advocacy efforts to maintain political action and investment in eye health, she said, adding it’s been a great help already to connect with planned activities taking place globally and in the Western Pacific region, such as the upcoming World Sight Day campaign.

 

Love Your Eyes to Bluff and back

 

EHA and IAPB are kicking off their partnership with a ‘Love Your Eyes’ campaign running for one month leading up to World Sight Day on Thursday 14^th October and finishing with a live eye test event at Land’s End in Bluff at 9am on World Sight Day itself.

 

Originally started by Lions Club International Foundation in 2000, World Sight Day is now coordinated by IAPB under the Vision 2020 global initiative programme, to promote a world where nobody is needlessly visually impaired. The New Zealand Bluff initiative will form the first and the southernmost World Sight Day event on the planet and is a great opportunity to raise awareness about the importance of eye health and the impact that low vision or blindness has in New Zealand, said Anna Crane, general manager of Macular Degeneration NZ, an EHA trustee. “We will be the first event for the international campaign. It will be live streamed around the world by the World Health Organisation in New York, followed by other events as they occur around the globe during the next 24 hours.”

 

MDNZ's Anna Crane

 

The Minister of Health, local MPs and mayors are invited to the event, which will include free eye tests and OCT imaging, said Crane, adding they were also hoping to gain significant New Zealand media attention.

 

The EHA is also encouraging the public, optometrists and ophthalmologists in New Zealand to pledge eye tests in the run-up to the Bluff event, as part of the IAPB’s aim to reach one million completed eye tests worldwide in the month prior to World Sight Day. “All eye health professionals need to do is to confirm an eye test has been completed,” said Crane. The pledges will be collected and live tracked on the IAPB website, with the total number of eye tests pledged confirmed at the EHA Bluff event.

 

Vision for all – UN landmark resolution

 

 

In other news, the United Nations (UN) General Assembly has adopted a ‘Vision for Everyone’ resolution, accelerating action to achieve its Sustainable Development Goals and committing the international community to eye health for the 1.1 billion people living with preventable sight loss by 2030. The resolution was passed unanimously by the UN’s 193 member countries and sets a 2030 target for vision for everyone, with each country promising to ensure full access to eyecare services for its population and to make eye health integral to their nation’s commitments.

 

For more information about the Love Your Eyes campaign, see www.iapb.org/world-sight-day. To pledge eye tests, visit www.eyehealthaotearoa.org.nz (link active from 14 September).

 

For information on the WHO’s global eye health targets, see https://eyeonoptics.co.nz/articles/archive/global-eye-health-targets-set/