Visionary sets sights on a cure for blindness

April 17, 2016

Students in a University of Wisconsin-Whitewater student organization are reaching far to work with a London-based eye surgeon to combat — and potentially eradicate — blindness in Botswana.  

The doctor, Andrew Bastawrous, has been working with UW-Whitewater Enactus and Madison-based nonprofit Combat Blindness International to create a sustainable future without blindness. Worldwide, 39 million people are blind, much of it in low-income countries, and up to 80 percent of blindness is curable. But the numbers alone can't convey the human impact of blindness.  

"It is only in statistics that people go blind by the millions," Bastawrous said. "The reality is they go blind by themselves."  

Bastawrous is sharing his progress on fighting blindness with the UW-Whitewater campus at Timmerman Auditorium in Hyland Hall on April 21, at 6 p.m. The talk, titled "See the Future," is free and open to the public.  

A native of Kenya, Bastawrous is a research fellow at the International Centre for Eye Health. Previous travel to developing countries with limited access to eye care and equipment prompted him to invent a smartphone device to remotely diagnose common vision. Called a Portable Eye Examination Kit, or PEEK, the device has been used to screen tens of thousands in rural Africa for common problems such as cataracts and refractive errors, bridging the geographic gap between the blind and the doctors who can help them.  

According to Bastawrous, "More people in Kenya and sub-Saharan Africa have access to a mobile phone than they do clean running water."  

Once diagnosed, a simple surgical solution costing less than $25 can restore vision to many. The PEEK program currently focuses on Botswana and Kenya but will later expand to other areas of Africa and India.  

The UW-Whitewater student organization Enactus, which is committed to using the power of entrepreneurial action to improve the quality of life and standard of living for people in need, has been working with PEEK and Combat Blindness International to find ways to lower that cost and make the funding model sustainable. Enactus members will present their recommendations to Bastawrous and other PEEK leaders during the campus visit on April 21.