By Our Correspondent
National Eye Centre has sensitized at least 500 Cadets as well as officers and Staff of the Nigerian Defence Academy, Mando, Kaduna on Glaucoma.
Speaking during a lecture on this year’s theme “Uniting for a Glaucoma free world” Dr. Hashiya Kana said “about 1.1 to 1.4 million Nigerians have Glaucoma and the prevalence is about 16.7 among individuals from 40 years and above, while about 70 million cases of Glaucoma are reported Globally with projections that 94 million cases will be recorded globally in 2030.”
“There are quite a lot of events we celebrate and sensitize people at Pantaker, in schools in Rigachukwu, in Mahuta” Kana maintained.
The representative of the NDA Commandant, Air Vice Marshall SK Aneke who thanked Eye Centre for bringing sensitization to the institution said “the eye is one of the key parts of the body. For us, we don’t joke with medical even before you come into the academy your eyes are checked properly. Glaucoma as we all know is something that creeps in silently so we deem it fit to check before it becomes a problem. For a soldier be you Army, Navy and Air Force you can’t identify what you can’t see. You can’t read what you can’t see Am a pilot and I know something u need to press button that are very tiny, even in the army sometimes you need to select coordinates, if you miss a digit life will be at stake so we in the military do not take anything that has to do with the body, medically with the eyes for joke. We thank the eye Centre in the continuation of our collaboration with them, we want to take this to the next level and this is just the first step in a lot of steps we are going to take.”
On his part, Director Administration Bashir Hussain Muhammad who represented the Acting Chief Medical Director revealed that “we look at our neighbors and partners who will fill can benefit from this campaign, actually cadets are being screened before taken into the academy but in the cause of work and age the eyes needs care and that’s why we are targeting the aged from 40 years upward. So this year we choose Nigeria Defense Academy and come with our equipments for screening, this is to ensure early detection just as the Guest lecturer said. The main issue in medicine now is prevention, not cure, the cost of cure is too high. ”
Free consultation and other forms of medication were administered to officers and staff of the _Academy.
