D’Urban Park Lion’s Club donates canes in observance of World Sight Day

Oct 10, 2020 News

Kaieteur News – There are currently 14,000 persons in Guyana who are visually impaired and almost 3,000 who are blind. In fact, according to Dr. Arlene Bobb-Semple, an ophthalmologist attached to the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation, there are 18,630 persons here who are inflicted with Diabetic retinopathy.

Representatives of the Lion’s Club of D’Urban Park presented a quantity of canes to the blind and visually impaired community.

Diabetic retinopathy is a diabetes complication that affects the eyes. It is caused by damage to the blood vessels of the light-sensitive tissue at the back of the eyes, an area called the retina.
Dr. Bobb-Semple said that this condition threatens the sight of some 4,658 persons.
Dr. Arlene Bobb-Semple, the Chairperson of the Lion’s Club of D’Urban Park Georgetown on Thursday addressed this state of affairs during a local observance of World Sight Day. World Sight Day is observed annually on the second Thursday in the month of October.
As part of the observance held under the theme: ‘Hope In Sight’, the Lion’s Club donated a quantity of canes to members of the blind and visually impaired community at an event held at the Girls Guide Pavilion, Brickdam, Georgetown.
Three of the visually impaired persons who received canes were from Linden, Region 10, while the others reside in Georgetown. According to Dr. Bobb-Semple, the beneficiaries were chosen based on recommendations made by various blind organisations in the country.
Among the recipients was Valerie Angela Simboo, 66, of West Ruimveldt, Housing Scheme. She told Kaieteur News that she is grateful for the Lion’s Club donation.
In her speech during the presentation, Dr. Bobb-Semple mentioned that “approximately 2.2 billion persons worldwide are affected by blindness or low vision and 90 percent of these are either reversible or prevented.” She also gave details of how persons can develop conditions such as visual impairment and blindness; macular degeneration, cataracts and some early cases of glaucoma.
To help combat these conditions, Dr. Bobb-Semple said persons “should have regular eye checkups. So from the time you reach 35 years (of age), you should have a yearly checkup, a good sleeping routine, eat healthy food, especially food containing Vitamin A, and for persons in front of computers they should take a 20 minutes break and this is to prevent eye strain.”
This humanitarian gesture was made to raise public awareness on issues surrounding blindness and vision impairment. This, she said, is in keeping with the aims of “World Sight Day”.
The doctor said that World Sight Day was created to influence in particular various health ministries in donating funds towards blindness prevention programmes. These programmes, she continued, must be focused on promoting education about blindness and to generate its support for the Vision 2020 programme.
Meanwhile, Ms. Carole James-Boston, Service Chairperson of the Lion’s Club of D’Urban Park also gave brief remarks. She said that the Lion’s Club of D’Urban Park of Lion’s Club International has been providing services to communities for in excess of 25 years. The organisation, she said, was pleased to make this presentation on “World Sight Day” despite the current pandemic the world is battling.

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