By Norah Owaraga | Project Leader and Managing Director
Please join us in celebrating and thanking Dr. A for the amazing work she does, restoring eyesight and worth of indigent persons in the poorest region of Uganda. And for going the extra mile to make it her mission to proactively educate us all on the importance of eyecare.
“Everything has changed for Maria. She says her granddaughters will be able to return to school, and she will be able to resume her life and enjoy her independence, a thing most people take for granted.”
This quote, above, we extracted from a recent post Dr. A shared on social media, with the permission of her indigent patient, she says; which story she described as “my highlight story for World Sight Day next month (October 2025).”
This motivated us, at CPAR Uganda, to enhance our conscious awareness and understanding of World Sight Day.
“World Sight Day is organised by the International Agency for the Prevention of Blindness (IAPB) and the World Health Organization (WHO). It takes place on the second Thursday in October; and this year it will be on Thursday 9 October 2025.”
Coincidentally, 9th October, is when Uganda celebrates and commemorates the day our republic gained ‘independence’ from the United Kingdom. How so fitting that Dr. A highlights Maria’s story of genuine independence gained through sight restoration on our nations Independence Day.
What is the more poignant about Maria’s eyesight restoration success story is the independence and freedom it gave to her daughters, as well, to return to school. According to Dr. A’s post, “Maria’s granddaughters had dropped out of school to care for her.”
“Maria shared that she had previously depended entirely on her two granddaughters for daily tasks such as cooking, washing clothes, and guiding her to the latrine. She felt a loss of dignity, unable to work on the farm, thatch her house, or sort grains,” shared Dr. A.
The reality is that there are likely hundreds of indigent households in the whole of Uganda, such as Maria’s, that are afflicted and affected by avoidable blindness needing assistance to be freed through sight restoration.
A Sight Savers “Rapid Assessment of Avoidable Blindness in Karamoja, Uganda” report, case in point, of which Dr. A is among the contributing authors, highlights that:
“The major cause of blindness was unoperated cataract (39.3%), with corneal opacities (trachoma and other causes) responsible for a further 32.6%. Cataract and age-related macular degeneration (ARMD) were also the most important causes of severe visual impairment: 59.2% and 9.6%, respectively.”
According to Dr. A’s post, Maria had endured “two years of avoidable blindness caused by cataract,” before she was freed through surgery and thus also freeing her granddaughters. Eye diseases are among those most neglected in public services provision in Uganda.
Due to absence of accessible eyecare services, many in Uganda who are afflicted with curable eye diseases often resign themselves to the fate of spending their lives blind. The few eyecare services that are available are often inaccessible to many, in terms of the long distance to travel to and from a competent healthcare facility and the inhibitive costs of care.
“Now I know that there is life in the Regional Referral Hospital. I can confidently tell people to come and have surgery. I will tell them about the miracles that happen in this place,” Dr. A shared Maria’s post-surgery testimony in her post.
We ask for your help to make “miracles” happen to other indigent households in Uganda afflicted by curable eye diseases. A donation of US$ 150 (about Ugx 525,000) equips an eye doctor with one cataract kit that is needed to perform cataract surgery on one patient.
Your donation will enable us to support the work of humanist ophthalmologists, such as Dr. A, who go the extra mile to extend eye care services to indigent persons, households and communities in Uganda who need it the most.
Thank you for joining us in celebrating Dr. A and in supporting her and of other eyecare practitioners such as her, to restore eyesight and worth of indigent persons in Uganda.
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