World Sight Day reflection from Danny Haddad, Inclusive Eye Health & NTDs Director

Blog | October 13, 2022

A World Sight Day reflection written by Dr. Danny Haddad, CBM Global’s Inclusive Eye Health and Neglected Tropical Diseases Director.

Ama Tus Ojos! Love your eyes!

This year at World Sight Day, I have the honour of being in Bolivia. Together with our country team, I visited our long-term partner, Caritas Coroico. The municipality of Coroico is about a three-hour drive from La Paz. With support from CBM Global, Caritas Coroico has furnished the local hospital with all the necessary equipment to provide eye services and surgeries.

The theme of World Sight Day, “Love Your Eyes!”, was brought to life for me by the stories from the patients I met at the hospital. All of them had recently been operated on for cataracts by Dra. Naraya Condori, who had recently finished her training, through the support of CBM Global, at Fundación Vision in Paraguay. The stories of the impact of not being able to see anything anymore, not being able to recognise their wife, or continuous falling and being afraid to break something and thinking that this would never change.

Luckily, they met the outreach team of Caritas Coroico, who informed them that they could get their sight back through a simple surgery. Now, after having undergone surgery and being able to see again, they can’t wait to be operated on on their second eye. In the meantime they have become great promoters of the programme, telling everybody about this life-changing surgery and recommending anyone who has lost their sight to get their screening done.

It was truly wonderful to spend these days with Father Freddy and his team of Caritas Coroico. The passion and commitment that they bring to this programme were truly humbling and heart-warming. I can’t wait to come back here and experience directly the amazing work that they are doing!

I want to end this brief sharing by announcing that CBM Global will support our partners around the world to screen 80,000 people for eye problems this month for World Sight Day!

Learn more about our Inclusive Eye Health work and our achievements in 2021.

 

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