NEW YORK—Today, organizations and companies across the world are coming together virtually for educational seminars, fundraisers and other advocacy in honor of World Sight Day. This year’s theme is Hope In Sight, and focuses on the recent World Health Assembly resolution for eye health. The IAPB said, “With political commitment to take action to make eyecare an integral part of Universal Health Coverage (UHC) and to implement ‘integrated people-centred eyecare’ there is #HopeInSight.” Today, Prevent Blindness is participating in World Sight Day, an annual day of awareness designed to focus global attention on blindness and vision impairment, by promoting advocacy efforts that seek to make vision and eye health a priority.
Prevent Blindness will launch a series of social media messages inviting the public to “Be A Visionary” and contact their government representatives to ask for their support of funding for programs that seek to put an end to preventable vision loss and blindness. Participants are encouraged to post about why they advocate for healthy eyesight with the hashtag #BeAVisionary. And, participants are also invited to share their vision story on Prevent Blindness’ World Sight Day-Be A Visionary online message board at https://www.kudoboard.com/boards/g7Cn7eZR.
Prevent Blindness provides a free resource on its website that allows users to learn about current proposed legislation related to vision as well as provides a tool for users to find the direct contact information for their government representatives at https://preventblindness.org/advocacy-initiatives/. Prevent Blindness is also participating in the World Sight Day Congressional Briefing “Addressing #COVID-19 related health care challenges with stronger telehealth policy: The future of medicine,” presented by Vision 2020 USA. The briefing will be held virtually beginning today at 11:00 a.m. ET.
Additionally, the Center for Vision and Population Health at Prevent Blindness (CVPH) is sharing the unique challenges of those with visual disabilities, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. For many individuals living with vision loss, the pandemic has compounding the difficulties they already face, including access to routine health care, as well as activities of daily living.
Individuals with vision loss face additional barriers to voting in the 2020 election as outlined in the CVPH Op-Ed. The group encourages all eligible voters to understand how they can safely participate in the upcoming November election and help ensure that sight-saving public health programs are funded at effective levels in the next Federal fiscal budget.
The goal of the CVPH is to raise awareness of vision and eye health as fundamental drivers of quality of life and to ensure all individuals are empowered to fully integrate vision and eye health into population health agendas. The CVPH works toward this goal by serving as a national technical assistance and policy resource for advancing vision and eye health from the population health perspective.
The Center was conceived to carry out the critical role as a convener of national experts on vision health, research, patient perspectives, and public health while collaborating with community, state and national stakeholders.
“As we all know, the upcoming election is critical to making sure that future public health funding, including for eyecare, is addressed,” said Jeff Todd, president and CEO of Prevent Blindness. “We strongly encourage everyone to learn about the platforms for all the candidates and make sure they vote by Nov. 3.” To make a donation toward the sight-saving efforts of Prevent Blindness, visit https://preventblindness.org/donate.
Alcon is honoring World Sight Day on Oct. 8 through corporate giving and company-led initiatives to improve access to quality eyecare, at a time when it matters more than ever before. Within its virtual booth at the Academy at Home virtual meeting, there is a “Hope In Sight” movie-trailer style video that inspires people to get their eyes checked, even during these uncertain times. The video can be viewed in the Corporate Giving section of the Alcon booth. Once 2,020 views have been reached, it triggers a $25,000 donation from the Alcon Foundation to the American Academy of Optometry Foundation to support training and education.
In addition to the “Hope in Sight” trailer, Alcon is continuing its corporate efforts through donating necessary surgical equipment, consumables and vision care supplies to help provide surgeries for uninsured patients.
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LensCrafters is partnering with graphic designer and illustrator Noma Bar for the launch of Your Eyes First (YEF), a new annual campaign to support World Sight Day. LensCrafters commissioned Bar to create graphic images for the campaign which will be showcased through digital touchpoints in LensCrafters stores and online.
Kicking off on World Sight Day, Your Eyes First will spotlight the mission of providing eyecare to communities around the world and the services that LensCrafters offers to support this goal. These services include comprehensive eye exams, prescription glasses, and working with OneSight, an independent nonprofit that provides access to quality vision care and glasses in underserved communities worldwide. The campaign will showcase the brand’s commitment to providing care to those who need it most, a message the retailer intends to reiterate each year on World Sight Day.
Modo is celebrating reaching one million children with its Buy a Frame—Help A Child See initiative, and partnering with Seva to launch a new campaign for the initiative, which will follow the stories of Ashutosh, who dreams of being an architect, Kaveri, an aspiring writer, and more children Modo has helped.
OneSight, Clearly and IAPB announced the release of a free downloadable kids' book called "Through the Looking Glasses," which features stories about seeing clearly for kids. At 7:00 p.m. local time inside the U.S. and 6:00 p.m. local time internationally, Adam Hills, Jo Frost, Michelle Yeoh, Billie Jean King, H.R.H. Princess Alia Al Hussein, Clark Gregg and more will read excerpts from the book online.
Nevakar is offering downloadable and shareable images for World Sight Day, each featuring educational social media copy about Myopia, World Sight Day and the importance of eye health. All the images are available on Nevakar's MyMyopia.com.
Vision Monday will continue to update this coverage as more organizations and companies announce their WSD20 plans. Stay tuned for our post-WSD20 roundup, too.