The Fred Hollows Foundation welcomes trachoma elimination in Australia

The Fred Hollows Foundation has welcomed the World Health Organization’s (WHO) confirmation that Australia has eliminated the eye disease trachoma as a public health problem. 

The Foundation’s Indigenous Australia Program Director Tanya Morris said the validation was the culmination of decades of collective effort across governments, Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisations and partners.

“The Foundation has worked collaboratively to support education and hygiene promotion initiatives that have been community-led. This long-term, community-owned approach has made trachoma elimination possible,” she said.

“This is a momentous day for Australia and one that all of those involved in trachoma elimination efforts have been working towards for decades.’

Trachoma is the world’s leading infectious cause of blindness which thrives in areas where drinking water and public sanitation is poor. The infection is easily spread through personal contact and by flies that have been in contact with people’s eyes or noses.

Fifty years ago, Fred Hollows set out on the National Trachoma and Eye Health Program, working alongside Aboriginal health workers and communities in remote areas of Australia.

Between 1976 and 1978, the team visited more than 465 communities and treating more than 100,000 people.

“From the beginning, Aboriginal leadership has been at the heart of Australia’s trachoma response,” Ms Morris said.

“Change has been driven by community-led programs to deliver clean water, safe housing, hygiene and culturally-safe health care services.

“Our focus is to protect the gains that have made and ensuring trachoma does not return. Prevention, housing and community-led approach must be at the heart of his approach.

“The Fred Hollows Foundation will continue to work alongside partners to close the continuing eye health gap that exists for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians.”

Students at a school in Ntaria being screened and treated during Trachoma Week in 2013.

Photo credit: The Fred Hollows Foundation

The Fred Hollows Foundation’s CEO Ross Piper congratulated all of those who had been involved in trachoma elimination over the past 50 years.

“This is an important time to recognise enabling community leadership and ownership of solutions is the only way to solve complex issues like trachoma,” Mr Piper said.

“The Fred Hollows Foundation reaffirms its longstanding commitment to this approach in all of our work.

“The achievement, borne of partnership between Government and Aboriginal communities is something the Australian Government can proudly showcase at the Global Summit for Eye Health at CHOGM in November.”