With most Filipinos taking their eyes for granted and failing to see the importance of having routine eye checkups, until there is already a problem, possibly a critical one at that. Eye experts urge the public to have their eyes thoroughly checked regularly.
Every August our country celebrates “Sight Saving Month”. The objective is to promote better awareness for eye health and encourage Filipinos to have their eyes checked. It aims to strengthen public awareness of the importance of proper eye care and the prevention of avoidable blindness and eye diseases.
Avoidable blindness and visual impairment is a serious global health issue. It imposes a significant health, social, and economic burden on individuals and communities. With the aim of eliminating the main causes of avoidable blindness by the year 2020, the global initiative ‘VISION 2020: The Right to Sight’ was launched in 1999 by the World Health Organization in partnership with the International Agency for the Prevention of Blindness, which promoted the development of sustainable eye care programs based on the three core strategies of disease control, human resource development and infrastructure and technology, incorporating the principles of primary health care.
Globally, uncorrected refractive errors are the main cause of visual impairment, while cataract remains the leading cause of blindness. Furthermore, 65% of visually-impaired and 82% of blind people are over 50 years old.
The top three causes of visual impairment are uncorrected refractive errors, cataract, and glaucoma. On the other hand, the top three causes of blindness are cataract, glaucoma, and age-related macular degeneration.
In the Philippines, the current estimated number of persons who are bilaterally blind is 569,072, of which 62.1% is due to cataract, 10.3% due to uncorrected refractive errors, 8% due to glaucoma, and 4% due to retinopathies.
George Optical supports this celebration and promotion of public awareness by offering a free comprehensive eye examination and initial contact lens assessment for the entire month of August, discounts will also be given on selected frames on all its twenty five (25) branches nationwide.
Patients can also give back by donating their old wearable eyeglasses, which in turn will be given to the less fortunate through the Dr. George Co, Sr. Foundation, in honor of George Optical’s founder.
For more than fifty years running, George Optical has a strong commitment to quality, and its success story is simply of a company with a heart and a simple vision: to make lives better through healthy vision. Truly, George Optical with its Chief Optometrist and President, Dr. Geoffrey Co, together with a team of licensed Optometrists and in-house ophthalmologist ensure that the founder’s philosophy lives on today.
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