Blind but mostly treatable

Of the 1.4 million visually impaired people in the world, one million live in Asia, including 37,000 in Bangladesh, say researchers.
They came up with the figures at a 16-day international training workshop on visual impairment that concluded at a city hotel on Thursday, said a press release.
About two lakh children are blind in the world due to cataract, which is treatable. Most of these cataract-affected children live in Asia and they fall to different eye-related diseases as most of them do not consult doctors, they said.
Apart from host Bangladesh, researchers from India, Indonesia, Thailand, Afghanistan and China took part in the workshop organised by Child Sight Foundation.
Dr Mohammad Muhit, a Bangladeshi ophthalmologist of international repute, was the chief trainer at the programme. Key Informant Method (KIM), invented by Dr Muhit, earned appreciation at the programme.
The KIM has ushered in a new era in the field of childhood visual impairment research as it has successfully been used in 12 countries for disability-related researches.