As many as 75% of Indians more than fifty years of age need eyeglasses but do not have them, Dr Jordan Kassalow, Founder of Vision Spring, an international non-profit organisation, said while speaking to Drug Today Medical Times at Delhi-AIIMS on the sideline of The third Leadership Exchange on Public Private Partnership.

During a session dedicated to long-sightedness, the participants deliberated on the need to make presbyopic (reading) glasses a commodity that can be purchased from the nearest vision centre without having a prescription by an ophthalmic assistant.

Presbyopia is an eye condition in which your eye loses the ability to focus quickly on close objects. It is a disorder that affects everyone during the natural ageing process.

According to the National Blindness Survey conducted by the RP Centre, AIIMS between 2015 to 2019, the prevalence of uncorrected presbyopia in people over fifty was 74.2%. The presbyopic age group (45 years) is estimated to be 275 million, with the majority benefiting from appropriate glasses.

“We discussed the huge need for eyeglasses in India. 75% of people in India need glasses but they do not have them,” Dr Kassalow added.

Experts from Union Health Ministry, WHO, Delhi-AIIMS, Vision Spring, Delhi Government, LV Prasad Eye Institute, SightSavers, Sri Sankara Deva Netralaya, Piramal Foundation, Chetak Foundation, 9.9 Education Consulting and  Jubilant Ingrevia discussed ways of providing glasses to the people who have uncorrected presbyopia and refractive errors.

In India, due to demographic transition, the population under 15 years of age is estimated at 400 million.

At a conservative 5% of them needing glasses, the annual need would be about 18 million (against the current NPCB&VI target of 1 million glasses to children).