The U.S. Atlantic Philanthropies (AP) and the Australian Fred Hollows Foundation (FHF) have funded a combined $2.06 million for a project to improve the capability of medical workers in the Vietnam National Institute of Ophthalmology (VNIO). Representatives of the VNIO and the two non-governmental organizations signed a memorandum on understanding on the aid in Hanoi July 23, the Voice of Vietnam Radio said late July 23. The two-year project will focus on developing national ophthalmological documents in line with the International Council of Ophthalmology standards, providing training courses for eye doctors in the northern and central provinces, setting up an eye care center for the poor under the VNIO and providing medical equipment for the VNIO. FHF Executive Director¸ Richard Le Mesurier, hoped that the project will help provide more qualified ophthalmologists serving for the national program on blindness prevention in Vietnam. The VNIO targets to offer surgeries for 170,000 cataract patients a year and eliminate trachoma in the country in 2012, the institute’s director Do Nhu Hon said. Vietnam now has only 1,229 ophthalmologists, mainly in big cities and identifies up to 85,000 new people with two-eye blindness and the same number with one-eye blindness due to cataract each year.
