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
. 2022 Mar 11:10:735335.
doi: 10.3389/fped.2022.735335. eCollection 2022.

Prevalence, Years Lived With Disability, and Time Trends for 16 Causes of Blindness and Vision Impairment: Findings Highlight Retinopathy of Prematurity

Rui-Heng Zhang  1 , Yue-Ming Liu  1 , Li Dong  1 , He-Yan Li  1 , Yi-Fan Li  1 , Wen-Da Zhou  1 , Hao-Tian Wu  1 , Ya-Xing Wang  2 , Wen-Bin Wei  1
Affiliations

Prevalence, Years Lived With Disability, and Time Trends for 16 Causes of Blindness and Vision Impairment: Findings Highlight Retinopathy of Prematurity

Rui-Heng Zhang et al. Front Pediatr. .

Abstract

Background: Cause-specific prevalence data of vision loss and blindness is fundamental for making public health policies and is essential for prioritizing scientific advances and industry research.

Methods: Cause-specific vision loss data from the Global Health Data Exchange was used. The burden of vision loss was measured by prevalence and years lived with disability (YLDs).

Findings: In 2019, uncorrected refractory error and cataract were the most common causes for vision loss and blindness globally. Women have higher rates of cataract, age-related macular degeneration (AMD), and diabetic retinopathy (DR) than men. In the past 30 years, the prevalence of moderate/severe vision loss and blindness due to neonatal disorders has increased by 13.73 and 33.53%, respectively. Retinopathy of prematurity (ROP) is the major cause of neonatal disorders related vision loss. In 2019, ROP caused 101.6 thousand [95% uncertainty intervals (UI) 77.5-128.2] cases of vision impairment, including 49.1 thousand (95% UI 28.1-75.1) moderate vision loss, 27.5 thousand (95% UI 19.3-36.60) severe vision loss and, 25.0 thousand (95% UI 14.6-35.8) blindness. The prevalence of new-onset ROP in Africa and East Asia was significantly higher than other regions. Variation of preterm birth prevalence can explain 49.8% geometry variation of ROP-related vision loss burden among 204 countries and territories. After adjusting for preterm prevalence, government health spending per total health spending (%), rather than total health spending per person, was associated with a reduced burden of ROP-related vision loss in 2019 (-0.19 YLDs for 10% increment). By 2050, prevalence of moderate, severe vision loss and blindness due to ROP is expected to reach 43.6 (95% UI 35.1-52.0), 23.2 (95% UI 19.4-27.1), 31.9 (95% UI 29.7-34.1) per 100,000 population.

Conclusion: The global burden of vision loss and blindness highlights the prevalent of ROP, a major and avoidable cause for childhood vision loss. Advanced screening techniques and treatments have shown to be effective in preventing ROP-related vision loss and are urgently needed in regions with high ROP-related blindness rates, including Africa and East Asia.

Keywords: blindness; prevalence; retinopathy of prematurity; visual impairment; years lived with disability.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Age-standardized, cause-specific YLD rate of blindness and distance vision impairment by Socio-Demographic Index groups, 1990–2019.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Age-standardized, cause-specific YLD rate due to neonatal disorders.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Incidence and Prevalence of ROP-related blinding varies among 21 GBD regions. (A) Incidence of ROP in 2019; (B) Prevalence of ROP in 2019.
Figure 4
Figure 4
Scatter plot and linear prediction of YLDs related to retinopathy of prematurity. (A) association between preterm birth prevalence and ROP-related vision loss burden among 204 countries and territories; (B) association between government health spending per total health spending (%) and ROP-related vision loss burden among 204 countries and territories, adjusted for preterm birth prevalence.
Figure 5
Figure 5
Forecast of age-standardized prevalence per 100,000 population due to retinopathy of prematurity.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

See all "Cited by" articles

References

    1. Bourne R, Steinmetz JD, Flaxman S, Briant PS, Taylor HR, Resnikoff S, et al. . Trends in prevalence of blindness and distance and near vision impairment over 30 years: an analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study. Lancet Global Health. (2021) 9:e130–43. 10.1016/S2214-109X(20)30425-3 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Blindness GBD Vision Impairment C Vision Vision Loss Expert Group of the Global Burden of Disease S . Causes of blindness and vision impairment in 2020 and trends over 30 years, and prevalence of avoidable blindness in relation to VISION 2020: the Right to Sight: an analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study. Lancet Global Health. (2020) 9:E144–60. 10.1016/S2214-109X(20)30489-7 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Xu T, Wang B, Liu H, Wang H, Yin P, Dong W, et al. . Prevalence and causes of vision loss in China from 1990 to 2019: findings from the Global Burden of Disease Study 2019. Lancet Public Health. (2020) 5:e682–91. 10.1016/S2468-2667(20)30254-1 - DOI - PubMed
    1. Taylor HR, Burton MJ, Haddad D, West S, Wright H. Trachoma. Lancet. (2014) 384:2142–52. 10.1016/S0140-6736(13)62182-0 - DOI - PubMed
    1. Tekle AH, Zouré HG, Noma M, Boussinesq M, Coffeng LE, Stolk WA, et al. . Progress towards onchocerciasis elimination in the participating countries of the African Programme for Onchocerciasis Control: epidemiological evaluation results. Inf Dis Poverty. (2016) 5:66. 10.1186/s40249-016-0160-7 - DOI - PMC - PubMed