This campaign has now closed
Since 2018, VFAN has scaled its successful nationwide primary eye care programme in Rwanda to an ambitious eye care initiative in Ghana. Working with the Ghana Health Service, we will make public sector eye health services available and accessible to local communities, in health centres and schools.
Categories
Beneficiaries
Situation
The World Health Organization estimates that 1.3 billion people suffer from vision impairment (VI), yet 80% of cases can be avoided or cured, often with a simple pair of glasses. VI is therefore the largest cause of disability worldwide, however low-income countries such as Ghana, which has 490,000 blind and visually impaired people, cannot afford to train sufficient ophthalmic personnel. The Upper East Region in particular, has few eye health professionals and no localised provision of glasses.
Solution
VFAN has launched a multi-year project to support the Ghana Health Service (GHS) to strengthen its primary eye care (PEC) services on a long-term and sustainable basis. The training of local nurses in eye care, support to deliver school screenings, and an eye health awareness raising campaign is already underway in Central Region. We are now ready to initiate Phase 2, in which we will support GHS to deliver PEC and school screening nationwide, starting in the marginalised Upper East Region.
