[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 157 (2011), Part 5]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages 6411-6412]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




         HONORING THE INTERNATIONAL EYE FOUNDATION MAY 2, 2011

                                 ______
                                 

                         HON. CHRIS VAN HOLLEN

                              of maryland

                    in the house of representatives

                          Monday, May 2, 2011

  Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the outstanding 
achievements of the International Eye Foundation as it celebrates its 
50th anniversary. IEF, which I am proud to say is based in my 
congressional district, is dedicated to the prevention of blindness and 
restoration of sight worldwide. In 2010, together with its partner eye 
care providers in Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East, IEF 
treated over 2 million people.
  The history of IEF's work is fascinating. Dr. John Harry King, Jr., 
IEF's founder and a pioneer of corneal transplantation, sought to 
address the high rates of blindness in the developing world and 
established the International Eye Bank in 1961 under the auspices of 
CARE/Medico. American eye surgeons were posted to the St. John Eye 
Hospital in Jerusalem to perform corneal transplant operations and 
train local surgeons. Dr. King soon realized, however, that much of the 
blindness in the developing world was preventable and that care could 
be provided before people became blind. The name of the organization 
was changed in 1965 to the International Eye Foundation, which 
sharpened its focus on blindness prevention and primary eye care.
  In order to remedy the dearth of eye specialists in developing 
countries, volunteer ophthalmologists were posted by IEF to countries 
throughout Asia, Africa and Latin America. Through IEF's Society of Eye 
Surgeons, Dr. King hosted a World Congress every four years, one of the 
earliest international eye meetings, bringing together distinguished 
leaders in ophthalmology and development specialists from around the 
world.
  Throughout the 1970's, IEF facilitated many ophthalmic training and 
exchange programs in Africa, the Middle East, and Asia. In 1972, U.S. 
eye surgeons were posted to Ethiopia and Kenya and, from 1976-1984, the 
USAID-supported ``IEF Kenya Rural Blindness Prevention Project'' became 
a model for East Africa. The training of ophthalmologists and 
Ophthalmic Clinical Officers was expanded while countless general 
physicians, nurses, and village health workers were trained in primary 
eye care. IEF facilitated an exchange program that exposed U.S. Navy 
residents to the challenges of providing eye care in Africa and the 
Middle East and brought doctors from Egypt and Ethiopia to the U.S. for 
fellowships. Ophthalmic and nurse training programs and vitamin A 
deficiency control programs were also conducted in Afghanistan, 
Pakistan, India, Bangladesh and Indonesia. IEF started Malawi's 
Ophthalmic Medical Assistants training program in 1980. Importantly, 
the Queen Elizabeth Central Hospital in Blantyre had no eye specialist, 
so IEF posted a series of American ophthalmologists there to provide 
care, surgery and training over 15 years.
  IEF helped establish Eye Banks in Amman, Jordan in 1979 and in Cairo, 
Egypt in 1980. Throughout the following decade, U.S. ophthalmologists 
were posted to a number of Caribbean nations for one year at a time. In 
1985, IEF became the first eye care development organization to be 
accepted into ``official relations'' with the World Health 
Organization. In 1986, USAID awarded child survival grants for programs 
in Africa and Latin America that focused on reducing blindness from 
vitamin A deficiency, the leading cause of blindness in children in 
developing countries at that time. The availability of Mectizan (the 
anti-parasitic drug ivermectin) from Merck & Company in 1990 allowed 
IEF to pioneer the first community-based ivermectin distribution 
programs in Guatemala, in collaboration with Africare in Nigeria, and 
in 1992 in Cameroon and Malawi.
  In the early 1990's, IEF was awarded a USAID grant for programs in 
Bulgaria and Albania. The grant enabled 18 U.S. ophthalmologists to 
provide training and technology for vitreo-retinal surgery and 
retinopathy of prematurity to save the sight of newborns. IEF also 
collaborated with the Dana Center for Preventive Ophthalmology at Johns 
Hopkins University to conduct the first random sample epidemiological 
blindness prevalence survey in Bulgaria.
  In the mid-1990's, LEF recognized that eye hospitals in developing 
countries were still underperforming and lacked management capacity and 
revenue sources. The SightReach Management program was then 
established, reorienting the organization's mission to sustainability 
planning for eye care institutions. This included developing a model 
that can be adopted by eye units in different

[[Page 6412]]

regions of the world. In 1999, with seed money from USAID, IEF focused 
on reducing blindness from unoperated cataract and addressing 
refractive error by improving efficiency, productivity and revenue-
generating services. IEF is now a global leader in sustainability 
programming for eye care with hospital partners in 15 countries.
  In 1999, IEF established its SightReach Surgical (SRS) program, 
making available a wide range of ophthalmic products from manufacturers 
worldwide to eye care providers and international developing 
organizations. The program has reduced the cost of technology and 
provided valuable procurement and advisory services to nations that 
would otherwise have limited access to such resources.
  Over the last 50 years, IEF has been instrumental in facilitating the 
tremendous growth in eye care services throughout the developing world, 
especially in Asia and Latin America. Cases of blindness due to 
trachoma, onchocerciasis, cataract, and blinding malnutrition have been 
reduced while the number of training programs, well-trained 
ophthalmologists, and modern technology has increased in developing 
countries. IEF has played a significant role in these achievements and 
has been supported by USAID, private foundations and the hundreds of 
thousands of individuals who support its mission.
  Mr. Speaker, I am honored to recognize the International Eye 
Foundation for its 50 years of extraordinary work and wish it continued 
success in making a difference in the lives of millions of people 
throughout the world.

                          ____________________