{"id":77282,"date":"2025-10-23T21:12:37","date_gmt":"2025-10-23T21:12:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/?p=77282"},"modified":"2025-10-23T21:12:37","modified_gmt":"2025-10-23T21:12:37","slug":"over-4-25-million-nigerians-blind-or-visually-impaired-sightsavers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/2025\/10\/23\/over-4-25-million-nigerians-blind-or-visually-impaired-sightsavers\/","title":{"rendered":"Over 4.25 Million Nigerians Blind or Visually Impaired -Sightsavers"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By Huldah Shado<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Sightsavers Nigeria has revealed that over 4.25 million Nigerians are blind or visually impaired, warning that the country faces a growing eye health crisis if access to care does not improve.<\/p>\n<p>The NGO made the disclosure on Thursday during a media partners\u2019 meeting in Keffi, Nasarawa State, aimed at promoting eye health awareness and combating Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTDs).<\/p>\n<p>Ms. Barbara Marok, Eye Health Programme Officer at Sightsavers, said many cases are preventable or treatable, including cataracts, glaucoma, and uncorrected refractive errors.<\/p>\n<p>She added that only 4.4% of Nigerians currently access eye care, compared to 38% in middle-income countries.<\/p>\n<p>Poor vision, she noted, costs the nation billions of naira annually due to reduced productivity and learning difficulties.<\/p>\n<p>Ms. Esther Bature, Advocacy Coordinator, stressed that discrimination against persons with disabilities limits their access to healthcare and education.<\/p>\n<p>She highlighted Sightsavers\u2019 inclusive initiatives such as the SMILE Project, Inclusion Works II, and the Girls Educational Skills Partnership-SABI Woman Programme, which aim to promote equality and social inclusion.<\/p>\n<p>Both officials called on the media to raise awareness, advocate for government support, close funding gaps, and ensure that persons with disabilities are included in Nigeria\u2019s health and development agenda.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Huldah Shado &nbsp; Sightsavers Nigeria has revealed that over 4.25 million Nigerians are blind or visually impaired, warning that the country faces a growing eye health crisis if access to care does not improve. The NGO made the disclosure on Thursday during a media partners\u2019 meeting in Keffi, Nasarawa State, aimed at promoting eye [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":77283,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[184,172],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-77282","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-health","category-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77282","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=77282"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77282\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":77284,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77282\/revisions\/77284"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/77283"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=77282"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=77282"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=77282"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}