The challenge of uncorrected refractive error: driving the agenda of the Durban Declaration on refractive error and service development

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to highlight the challenge of uncorrected refractive error globally, as well as to discuss recent advocacy successes and innovative programs designed to address the need for broader refractive error service development, particularly in developing countries. The World Health Organization's VISION 2020: The Right to Sight program first posed the challenge to national governments to give priority to strategies and resources targeted towards avoidable causes of blindness and visual impairment, so that these unnecessary forms of blindness or visual impairment can be eliminated globally by the year 2020. The blindness prevention community is challenged to increase in scale its initiatives, which support the attainment of VISION 2020: The Right to Sight goals primarily and the United Nation's Millennium Development Goals indirectly. The Durban Declaration on Refractive Error and Service Development was the outcome of a meeting of eye-care professionals, researchers, governments, civil society and industry in March 2007 and still stands as a guiding document to the blindness prevention community for the elimination of avoidable blindness due to uncorrected refractive error.