Posted on: 06-09-06 13:46:37
Quote:
Despite several campaigns to promote eye donation, only 20,000 eyes are collected every year throughout the country, of which Gujarat accounts for around 6,000.
"This is a sad state of affairs. There are 12 million blind people in India, of whom four million are corneally blind. However, our eye collections have been abysmally low, compared to the number of people dying every year," said Dr PN Nagpal, of the Ahmedabad Retina Foundation, while addressing a press conference.
He said infrastructure is a problem as there are only 400 eye banks in the whole country and just 10 in Gujarat, with five of them in Ahmedabad alone.
He said that we are now stressing upon increasing the number of eye collection centres, which can do the collections and send them to eye banks.
"It is a shame that we still have to import eyes from Sri Lanka, which is 1/4th or even less of India's size," he said.
Talking about the high rate of eye donations in Gujarat, Dr Nagpal said Gujaratis are known for their benevolence. "Be it Orissa floods or tsunami in Andamans, Gujarat is always ready with help. This could be the reason why we see a major chunk of eyes from this state."
Complete Story here: http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/181_1787584,000900040003.htm" target="_blank">http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/181_1787584,000900040003.htm
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