Projects

Alliance to Fight Avoidable Blindness

Alliance to Fight Avoidable Blindness

The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that there are approximately 285 million visually impaired people worldwide, out of which 39 million are blind and 246 million have low vision. Globally, uncorrected refractive errors are the main cause of moderate and severe visual impairment, while cataract remains the leading cause of blindness in middle- and low-income countries. Other major causes of visual impairment are glaucoma, age related macular degeneration, diabetic retinopathy, corneal capacity, childhood blindness and trachoma. As a result, 80% of all visual impairment can be prevented or cured. The majority of visually impaired people (90%) live-in low-income countries; 9.2% (about 26.3 million) in Africa,,  

It is against this background that in 1999, WHO, in partnership with the more than 20 international non-governmental organizations that comprised the International Agency for the Prevention of Blindness (IAPB), launched an initiative known as "Vision 2020 - the Right to Sight". VISION 2020 is a partnership that provides guidance, technical support and resources to countries that have formally adopted its agenda. The mission of initiative is to eliminate the main causes of all preventable and treatable blindness as a public health issue by the year 2020. 

First Generation of the Alliance

After successful cataract campaigns in Sub-Saharan Africa from 2003 - 2007, the Islamic Development Bank formulated and launched its regional initiative” the Alliance to Fight Avoidable Blindness” in 2008 to provide comprehensive, accessible and sustainable eye care services in eight IsDB member countries.

The Alliance to Fight Avoidable Blindness started with a five-year program developed to reduce the prevalence of blindness due to cataract and to improve access to, and quality of, eye health care in Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Chad, Djibouti, Guinea, Mali and Niger. These countries are characterized by cataract surgical rates among the lowest in the World, insufficient number of ophthalmologists and a significant backlog of patients suffering from cataract. 

The First Generation (2008 - 2015), provided eye care to more than 244,000 people; restored sight to more than 49,000 blind people; capacity building for more than 177 doctors and technicians; and provided the special medical equipment needed to combat eye diseases in the beneficiary countries. 

Second Generation of the Alliance

The evaluation of some operations carried out during the first generation confirmed the relevance of this program and its role in identifying the vital needs in eye care in relation to avoidable blindness and the partial response to these needs. It also demonstrated the effectiveness and efficiency of the operations carried out and their undeniable impact on the social and economic situation of the populations. 

The evaluation recommended focusing in the future on national capacity development and increasing the involvement of ministries of health for putting blindness control at the heart of development programs. 

Against this background, the Islamic Development Bank, the Islamic Solidarity Fund for Development and 32 technical and financial partners formulated the Second Generation of the Alliance (2019-2023). 

The goal of the Alliance is to contribute to the achievement of Sustainable Development Goal 3 (good health and well-being) aiming to enable everyone to live in good health and promote the well-being of all people of all ages.

The Second Generation, while pursuing its goal of reducing the prevalence of blindness due to cataract, extends its reach to other preventable ocular conditions, namely refractive errors, glaucoma and diabetic retinopathy. In addition to providing eye care services, the Alliance will also focus on developing the capacity of national blindness programs, including eye care staff.

The Alliance's interventions, which have been agreed upon with national programs to combat blindness, focused on the provision of services for cataract, refractive errors, glaucoma and retinopathy diabetes, and on the development of national capacities in this field. Each country will draw up its 5 Year work plan based on a capacity and needs analysis.

Objectives 

The Second Generation of the Alliance envisages, over a five-year period to:

  • Realize 1,500,000 cataracts surgical operations;
  • Develop of 4 national intervention programs for the correction of refraction;
  • Carry out examinations for the detection of ocular refractive errors for the benefit of 10 million schoolchildren and supplies of correction glasses when necessary;
  • Develop capacities of 6 glaucoma treatment centres in member countries;
  • Develop capacities of at least 3 regional training centres;
  • Enhance capacities of 90 eye care specialists.

Target Countries

The Second Generation of the Alliance will benefit 13 member countries of the Islamic Development Bank: Burkina Faso, Chad, Comoros, Côte d'Ivoire, Djibouti, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Mauritania, Mali, Mozambique, Niger, Somalia, and Togo.

Cost of the Program

The overall cost of the Second Generation was estimated at US $ 30 million. The Islamic Solidarity Fund for Development has approved US $ 5 million to support the Second Generation.

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