World Sight Day
350 million people worldwide live with severe vision impairment. In high income countries, vision impairment is usually caused by diseases of ageing, inherited eye conditions, or complications of diabetes. However, in the global South the main reason for people being vision impaired, or even blind, is simply not having spectacles. More than 150 million people could have their vision restored by the simple act of having the correct glasses prescribed and supplied, an intervention which costs only a few euros.
Vision impairment has far reaching consequences. Unemployment is very high in people with sight loss, even in countries with good access to work schemes such as Sweden, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. Independence and autonomy is reduced, limiting access to cultural and social activities, leading to higher levels of loneliness and social isolation in this population.
Vision impairment can also affect mental health. Being vision impaired increases the likelihood of having depression, anxiety, and post-traumatic stress disorder, and large population-based studies have repeatedly shown lower mental wellbeing in people who report having poor eyesight.
However, not everyone with vision impairment has lower wellbeing. Research from our group, supported by the Macular Society, shows that people with inherited macular disease who receive support such as counselling and low vision assessment (which provides appropriate spectacles, magnifiers, and signposting to other services) have, on average, the same level of wellbeing as people without sight loss.
New technology can also help. Artificial Intelligence (AI)-based smartphone apps like Seeing AI can read text, identify faces and recognise colours. The online service BeMyEyes has the second largest volunteer workforce in the world, who provide real-time video-based assistance, answering questions like ‘where have I dropped my keys?’, ‘what does this label say?’ and ‘does this plant need watering?’. Meta AI is available on Ray-Ban and Oakley glasses, giving discreet access to scene description, text-to-speech reading and location-specific advice. With colleagues from across Europe, we have applied for grant funding to investigate the safe and effective use of AI-based assistive technology by people with vision impairment, determining whether it can reduce activity limitation, increase participation and improve wellbeing.
World Sight Day allows us to reflect on all of those living with vision impairment and blindness, and to work to increase access to solutions which overcome the effects of sight loss, from long-standing low-technology strategies like glasses and contact lenses to 21st century approaches like artificial intelligence. Ultimately this may increase the wellbeing of tens of millions of people worldwide.
Senior Research Fellow at University College London and a Principal Optometrist in low vision at Moorfields Eye Hospital NHS Foundation Trust.