Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Meta-Analysis
. 2021 Jul 1;139(7):717-723.
doi: 10.1001/jamaophthalmol.2021.0527.

Prevalence of Visual Acuity Loss or Blindness in the US: A Bayesian Meta-analysis

Abraham D Flaxman  1 , John S Wittenborn  2 , Toshana Robalik  1 , Rohit Gulia  1 , Robert B Gerzoff  3 , Elizabeth A Lundeen  4 , Jinan Saaddine  4 , David B Rein  2 ; Vision and Eye Health Surveillance System study group
Collaborators, Affiliations
Meta-Analysis

Prevalence of Visual Acuity Loss or Blindness in the US: A Bayesian Meta-analysis

Abraham D Flaxman et al. JAMA Ophthalmol. .

Abstract

Importance: Globally, more than 250 million people live with visual acuity loss or blindness, and people in the US fear losing vision more than memory, hearing, or speech. But it appears there are no recent empirical estimates of visual acuity loss or blindness for the US.

Objective: To produce estimates of visual acuity loss and blindness by age, sex, race/ethnicity, and US state.

Data sources: Data from the American Community Survey (2017), National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (1999-2008), and National Survey of Children's Health (2017), as well as population-based studies (2000-2013), were included.

Study selection: All relevant data from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Vision and Eye Health Surveillance System were included.

Data extraction and synthesis: The prevalence of visual acuity loss or blindness was estimated, stratified when possible by factors including US state, age group, sex, race/ethnicity, and community-dwelling or group-quarters status. Data analysis occurred from March 2018 to March 2020.

Main outcomes or measures: The prevalence of visual acuity loss (defined as a best-corrected visual acuity greater than or equal to 0.3 logMAR) and blindness (defined as a logMAR of 1.0 or greater) in the better-seeing eye.

Results: For 2017, this meta-analysis generated an estimated US prevalence of 7.08 (95% uncertainty interval, 6.32-7.89) million people living with visual acuity loss, of whom 1.08 (95% uncertainty interval, 0.82-1.30) million people were living with blindness. Of this, 1.62 (95% uncertainty interval, 1.32-1.92) million persons with visual acuity loss are younger than 40 years, and 141 000 (95% uncertainty interval, 95 000-187 000) persons with blindness are younger than 40 years.

Conclusions and relevance: This analysis of all available data with modern methods produced estimates substantially higher than those previously published.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Conflict of Interest Disclosures: Dr Flaxman reported grants from NORC as a subcontract from a US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention during the conduct of the study; payments from Janssen, IHME, SwissRe, and Merck for Mothers for assistance in analysis and interpretation of licensed data previously produced by IHME; and payment from the startup Agathos Ltd for advising outside the submitted work. Dr Rein reported grants from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Vision Health Initiative during the conduct of the study. No other disclosures were reported.

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.. Crude Prevalence of Visual Acuity Loss or Blindness by Age for All Racial/Ethnic Groups
Increases appear starting at approximately age 60 years.
Figure 2.
Figure 2.. Age-Standardized, Sex-Standardized, and Race/Ethnicity–Standardized Visual Acuity Loss or Blindness Prevalence by State
Figure 3.
Figure 3.. Age-Standardized, Sex-Standardized, and Race/Ethnicity–Standardized Blindness Prevalence Estimates by State
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Comment in

References

    1. Bourne RRA, Flaxman SR, Braithwaite T, et al. ; Vision Loss Expert Group . Magnitude, temporal trends, and projections of the global prevalence of blindness and distance and near vision impairment. Lancet Glob Health. 2017;5(9):e888-e897. doi:10.1016/S2214-109X(17)30293-0 - DOI - PubMed
    1. Scott AW, Bressler NM, Ffolkes S, Wittenborn JS, Jorkasky J. Public attitudes about eye and vision health. JAMA Ophthalmol. 2016;134(10):1111-1118. doi:10.1001/jamaophthalmol.2016.2627 - DOI - PubMed
    1. Prevent Blindness America . Vision problems in the US: prevalence of adult vision impairment and age-related eye disease in America. Published 2012. Accessed September 30, 2019. http://www.visionproblemsus.org/
    1. Varma R, Vajaranant TS, Burkemper B, et al. . Visual impairment and blindness in adults in the United States. JAMA Ophthalmol. 2016;134(7):802-809. doi:10.1001/jamaophthalmol.2016.1284 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Elam AR, Lee PP. High-risk populations for vision loss and eye care underutilization. Surv Ophthalmol. 2013;58(4):348-358. doi:10.1016/j.survophthal.2012.07.005 - DOI - PubMed

Publication types