KARACHI, March 9: More than 63,000 cataract surgical procedures are being carried out annually in the province, as part of the activities of the Prevention and Control of Blindness Programme in Sindh.

Project director, Sindh PCB Programme, Prof Ziauddin Shaikh, told the participants of a media workshop held at the PCB Cell at the Civil Hospital on Saturday that the existing figure represented a threefold increase in the number of such procedures performed prior to 1996.

Providing details of the programme activities and objects, Prof Ziauddin said that its primary aim was to fight cataract blindness by strengthening the existing infrastructure and expertise to deal with the problem.

In Sindh, according to a survey, prevalence of blindness stands at 1.78 per cent of the population. According to the World Health Organization, as much as 70 per cent of blindness is due to cataract, while an additional 10-15 per cent is also preventable. This means that more than 80 per cent of the existing blindness is avoidable.

Providing statistics on prevalence of blindness in Sindh, Prof Ziauddin said that there were 341899 totally blind people in Sindh, while the prevalence of the cataract blind was 251637 comprising 503274 eyes.

Prof Ziauddin said that under the programme objectives, various courses were being conducted to provide training to ophthalmic technicians. In addition, he said, regular continuing medical education sessions on primary eye care were also being held for ophthalmologists, general physicians, community-based workers and healthcare managers.

Besides human resource development, the Sindh PCB Programme is also engaged in equipping and maintaining District and Taluka eye units all over the province and conducting outreach camps for enhancing the annual cataract surgical rates.

He said that in the last five years, more than 57 eye camps were organized under the programme, at which a total of 8049 cataract surgeries had so far been performed.