As heard on ABC Radio National, The Foundation's Country Manager in Pakistan, Dr Rubina Gillani, tells how we’ve helped halve blindness in Pakistan since 1998.

Across Pakistan nearly one in ten people are visually impaired, with more than two million people blind in both eyes. The Foundation has a strong partnership with the Government of Pakistan and is working in all four provinces of the country.

Since The Foundation started work in Pakistan in 1998, the rate of blindness is down from 1.8% of the population to 0.9%.

Listen to the interview on Fran Kelly's ABC Radio National Breakfast program.
2012: Achievement highlights

By working with government and local partners The Foundation:
  • Performed 19,330 cataract operations and 11,118 other sight saving or improving interventions
  • Trained 11 surgeons including the first paediatric and vitro-retinal ophthalmologists to complete fellowships in the public sector in Baluchistan
  • Trained 93 clinic support staff and 872 community health workers
  • Constructed, upgraded or renovated nine facilities
  • Screened 233,196 people for eye health
  • Delivered $545,629 in medical equipment
  • Screened over 150,000 children in remote and underprivileged districts, distributed over 3,000 spectacles and trained 2,691 teachers in basic eye health through the school eye health program
  • Initiated two remote community projects to screen for diabetes and eye disease in young children.