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A CASE FOR SUPPORT
If her sight disappears, so does she.
A N U R G E N T C A S E T O A D D R E S S A
The idea of blindness is
paralyzing. When your sight
disappears, so does the world
around you. Imagine not being
able to see the chalkboard, not
being able to read a book, not
being able to see your child’s
artwork, and missing
the beauty of nature.
For people who live in
developing countries,
losing sight is catastrophic.
For children, access to
education disappears.
For adults, the ability to support
their families disappears. They
are often unemployed with no
way to support their families or
contribute to their communities.
Yet, for millions of people, this
impairment could be treated,
or could have been prevented,
with access to quality eye
health care. They are needlessly
suffering.
Together, we can prevent
blindness and restore sight.
We can transform lives.
G L O B A L C R I S I S .
“We share the same sunshine; we breathe the same
oxygen. Why should others suffer in blindness that can be
prevented? Let’s end injustice.”
– Dr. Hillary Rono, Operation Eyesight Partner Ophthalmologist
According to the World Health Organization’s World Report on Vision,
over one billion people suffer from vision impairment that could have
been prevented or could be treated. Almost 90 per cent of these cases
are in low- and middle-income countries, where quality eye health care
is not accessible to all. Some live in remote areas, where access to health
care seems impossible. For some, their families hold beliefs that people
who are suffering are to blame for their blindness, and they must live
with this predicament.
Your support saves and improves the lives of millions.
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Case For Support
As her sight disappears, so does her education.
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The need.
Vision impairment and blindness impede access to
education, employment and other opportunities.
Vision is a basic human right. For children who
experience vision impairment in developing countries,
there are serious repercussions that affect success later
in life. They are significantly less likely to be enrolled
in school than children without disabilities, and if they
are enrolled, they are more likely to drop out. This
effect is observed even more in girls than in boys, as
girls are often required to stay home to care for family
members and to manage household chores.
Children with vision impairment lose the opportunity for
a brighter future that an education provides. Adults lose
the ability to support their families and contribute to
their communities. They are often marginalized by those
around them.
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Case For Support
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Vision impairment is a human rights issue. The most severe
consequences of blindness are felt by those already living in poverty.
Vision impairment is also a gender
issue. More women and girls endure
the consequences of vision impairment
than men and boys. Women face more
barriers to accessing eye health care.
One reason for the disparity is that
women live longer than men, so they
are more likely to develop age-related,
non-communicable eye diseases such
as cataract, glaucoma and macular
degeneration. But despite the fact that
more women than men are affected
by the condition, women are not
prioritized to receive treatment.
Women and girls are also at increased
risk for infectious eye diseases because
of traditional gender roles. Women
and girls carry the burden of staying
behind to tend to household chores
and caretaking responsibilities. Not
only does this increase their risk of
contracting trachoma themselves, but
it often limits their opportunities to go
to school or find employment.
How can this cycle be broken to give
people a chance to thrive?
Health systems face significant challenges in meeting the current
and projected eye care needs of the world’s population. You can
help break the cycle by empowering people and communities to
take ownership of their eye health.
Through door-to-door community
outreach in remote villages combined
with counselling and health
education, every single child, woman
and man in a community can be
reached. They can be screened for
vision issues, referred for diagnosis
and further care, and educated about
available treatment options and how
they can prevent blinding conditions
for themselves and their families.
With your help, women and men will
have more opportunities, children
will be healthier and can pursue an
education, and communities will
become stronger and more resilient.
We have the solution.
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Case For Support
When you restore sight for one person, you restore hope and optimism for an entire family. A mother’s hope for her children’s
future is restored.
Living in a remote area of Kenya,
Julia struggled to raise her family.
Four of her six children, and her
one-year-old granddaughter,
had suffered from blindness since
birth. Julia was told they couldn’t
be treated. She was desperate
for a solution, and their future
looked bleak.
In 2019, Julia heard about a
nearby eye screening camp
organized by Operation Eyesight.
There, the children were
diagnosed with cataracts,
and were referred for surgery.
Without surgery, Julia’s children
and granddaughter would have
continued to struggle in school,
trapping them in the cycle of
poverty. Surgery restored their
sight and gave them another
chance at a better life.
Compassionate donors like you
made a brighter future possible
for this family. Don’t let a child
live another day with blindness
that can be easily treated.
Compassionate donors like you made a brighter future possible for
this family. Don’t let a child live another day with blindness that can
be easily treated.
Join the movement today.
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Case For Support
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IMAGE OF A COMMUNITY
You can create access to eye
health care for a person who
has lost hope that a solution
exists. Your support allows
us to reach people who
are typically unreachable,
ensuring that every person
in every household of our
remote target villages is
screened, counselled and
referred for further care by
someone who lives and works
in their own community.
You can provide quality
eye health care to someone
who can’t afford to pay for
it. Your support will ensure
trained professionals are
available in well-equipped
facilities that are accessible to
all in a specific region. Over
time, the revenue generated
from patients who can pay
for services offsets the needs
of those who can’t afford it.
These facilities become self-
sufficient and communities
proudly look after their own
citizens without the need for
external aid.
You can give people access
to clean water and sanitary
conditions, eliminating the
risk of blinding bacterial
diseases. Diseases such as
trachoma are spread through
poor hygiene, due to a lack
of education about why
it’s important and a lack of
access to clean water. You
support the prevention of
future cases of trachoma
through the drilling or
rehabilitation of boreholes
to bring fresh water to
communities who don’t
have it, and by educating
communities on the
importance of good hygiene
and sanitation practices.
Today, you can join the global movement to change the lives of people who are affected by
avoidable blindness in developing countries. To create lasting change in the countries where
we work, we need to equip these communities to prevent blinding eye conditions, to have access
to quality eye health care, to have knowledge of the care available to them, and to adopt the
behaviour of seeking that care when they need it. This will put an end to avoidable blindness and
create a culture of empowerment for generations to come. Your support makes this possible.
We can’t do it alone.
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Our model is community focused.
Community health workers
empower people by giving them the
knowledge and tools they need to
care for their families. We ensure
help will be there when they need it
by working with our partner hospital
to ensure they have the personnel,
facilities and supplies available to
provide quality eye health care
to everyone in the surrounding
communities. This model lays the
foundation for resilient communities
for years to come.
Our model can be scaled up to reach
even more people. By helping to
build capacity and improve quality
of care in our partner hospitals and
vision centres in India, we have
made it possible for them to attract
patients who can afford to pay for
treatment. In turn, these paying
patients help subsidize the treatment
of those who can’t afford to pay,
creating a sustainable resource that
will serve the community well into
the future. We aim to expand this
successful and sustainable model
to other countries where avoidable
blindness is prevalent.
While our ultimate goal is to
eliminate avoidable blindness, our
model changes lives in many other
ways. Our model goes beyond sight
and promotes overall good health
and well-being. When people can
see to work, they have a chance
to break the cycle of poverty. We
address inequalities in eye health
care for women, empowering them
and expanding their options. And
we provide communities with clean
water and sanitation to reduce the
spread of disease and allow the
community to thrive.
Our Hospital-Based Community Eye Health model takes an inclusive,
integrated approach to eye health care. This approach allows us
to not only target the medical problems that lead to avoidable
blindness, but the socio-economic causes as well.
Why us?
As their sight disappears, so do
their opportunities.
- 13 -- 12 -
Case For Support
Founded in 1963 in Calgary, Canada,
we have been recognized as a
global leader working towards the
elimination of avoidable blindness
for decades. We collaborate with our
hospital and government partners
in low- and middle-income countries
to invest in sustainable eye health
treatment, prevention and community
development to create a better life
for people now and into the future.
We currently have programs in India,
Nepal, Bangladesh, Kenya, Zambia,
Ghana, Ethiopia and Liberia, and
we are looking to expand to other
countries in the future. We adhere
to the highest standard of integrity,
accountability and compassion, and
we live those principles in our work
every day.
Although our organization has a
strong presence in Canada, most of
our employees are based locally in
the countries where we work. This
allows us to utilize local expertise to
maximize your impact, and enables
the communities we operate in to
be empowered to take ownership of
their own eye health so they are not
reliant on us.
For over a decade, we have developed
and implemented our Hospital-Based
Community Eye Health model of
eye care to reach people in remote
locations. This model empowers
communities by connecting them
with quality eye health care and
education, leading to the elimination
of avoidable blindness in entire
villages. With the support of our
donors, this proven effective model
has changed the lives of millions of
people in India, and we have started
to successfully implement it into
other countries where we work.
Our model can be scaled to countries
around the world, with the potential
to eliminate avoidable blindness
worldwide. It positions us to become
an important player in implementing
the recommendations of the World
Health Organization’s 2019 World
Report on Vision, which calls for an
integrated approach.
About us.
Your support brings sustainable facilities to serve people in remote areas for generations to come.
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Case For Support
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With your support, community health workers are trained to reach people in remote areas.
It all starts with the
community health worker.
As a young woman living in a
small village in Nepal, Amita was
expected to stay home and look
after her family. She dreamed of
a future serving her community
as a nurse, but her family couldn’t
afford to send her to school.
The opportunity to become a
community health worker in her
village gave Amita the fulfillment
she always wanted. Every day she
changes lives in her community.
She educates people to understand
that superstitions do not affect
health issues, and she teaches them
to look after their own eye health.
When she identifies children or
adults with eye health issues, she
refers and sometimes accompanies
them to the closest eye health
clinic. She has become a respected
expert in the area where she lives.
You can provide training and
fulfilling opportunities for
women to make a huge impact
in their communities.
“ Now whenever people have problems with their eyes, they come to
me for a solution.”
- 17 -- 16 -
Case For Support
Vision impairment affects an individual at
every stage of life. For children, it can impact
their ability to learn and interact with their
peers and their families. For adults, it can
hinder their ability to gain employment,
keeping them from earning an income and
caring for the ones they love. For more senior
adults, it can be isolating. It threatens their
independence and their ability to contribute
to their families.
Eliminating avoidable blindness is our
primary objective. To accomplish this,
our comprehensive model is designed to
eliminate all forms of inequity in eye health
care. It addresses gender equity, ensuring
that women and girls receive quality care,
and key prevention components such
as community water and sanitation.
By donating to Operation Eyesight you’re
not just providing eye health care to some
of the most underserved groups in the world
— you’re also helping to build progressive,
resilient communities.
When a woman is empowered to make
decisions regarding her own health, she can
improve the overall health of her family and
contribute to the growth of her community.
If a woman is given the gift of sight, she has
a greater chance to pursue education and
meaningful employment. Eliminating gender
inequality is the right thing to do, but it also
creates a better community for everyone.
Empowering women is one of the strongest
catalysts for driving sustainable development
across all sectors. It enhances economic
growth, improves education and increases
positive health outcomes.
The impact you can make is astounding.
Through the gift of sight, you can put an
end to poverty, inequality and hopelessness.
You can restore what has disappeared.
You can transform lives.
The ability to see is only the beginning of the impact your donation
will have on someone’s life. Quality eye health care contributes to
overall quality of life in many ways. The ripple effect that flows
from proper eye health care leads to the decline of inequality
and allows communities to thrive.
What we can do together.
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Case For Support
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The World Health Organization
estimates that global demand for
eye health care will triple by 2050
as a result of population growth,
aging and changes in lifestyle.
Please give today. Don’t let
another person suffer needlessly
from avoidable blindness.
The people who need us are at
the heart of our model. We ensure
that we reach people who are
marginalized, providing them
with quality eye health care and
educating them to look after their
families and their communities.
Our model provides vision centres
to serve people who live far from
hospitals, and these vision centres
become financially self-sustaining
in a very short time, giving people
a health care resource that will
serve those who need it for
generations to come. This model
has changed millions of lives, and
it has the potential to give hope to
many more.
With your help, Operation Eyesight
can support the continued delivery
of effective, sustainable and
impactful solutions to address the
global crisis. You can ensure that
quality eye health care will be
available to everyone – today,
and well into the future.
Will you help?
Join us in eliminating the world’s largest unaddressed disability.*
* Essilor. (2020, February). Eliminating Poor Vision in a Generation Report. Retrieved from www.essilorseechange.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/Eliminating-Poor-Vision-in-a-Generation-Report.pdf
Increase the capacity
of a hospital to
provide quality eye
health care to more
people who need it.
Bring clean water
and sanitation to a
community.
Establish a school
screening program
to ensure children
with vision issues are
identified and helped.
Provide eye health
training to increase
expertise in the
communities where
it’s most needed.
Establish a vision
centre to serve remote
communities that are
far from hospitals.
Eliminate avoidable
blindness in a
designated district.
Through the gift of sight, you can fund a project that will:
Talk to us about our priority projects. We can help you find a project that
fits your investment budget and is aligned with your giving priorities.
Charitable Registration Number: Canada 119068955 RR0001 | United States 20-2682468 | United Kingdom 1135169
- 21 -- 20 -
“We are motivated, but we need your help. You can transform the lives of people who need it the most.”Aly Bandali, President and CEO, Operation Eyesight
There are many ways you can make a difference. You can donate online at
operationeyesight.com/donate, through our Calgary office, or through one
of the following options:
Corporate Giving
Your company can partner with us for your
Corporate Social Responsibility program, set up an
employee giving program or donate as part of your
commitment to the World Health Organization’s
Sustainable Development Goals.
Legacy Gift Leave a gift in your will to Operation Eyesight.
You can designate a specific amount, or leave a
percentage of your estate.
Gift of Stocks and Securities
By donating securities directly to Operation
Eyesight, you’ll avoid capital gains taxes, maximize
the return on your investment and preserve your
tax credits to be used against other taxable income.
Make a Gift in Honour of a Loved One
You can dedicate a meaningful gift to someone
important while also helping to transform the lives
of children, families and communities in developing
countries. Operation Eyesight will send a
customizable ecard or a print card to the recipient.
Monthly Donations
By signing up to give a monthly donation, you
can ensure that eye care is available year round
to those who need it.
Ways to Give.
operationeyesight.com