Myopia Awareness initiative reached to 1 Crore People across India
New Delhi, 25 November 2022: The National Myopia Awareness Week campaign (14-20 November) initiated by the ENTOD Eye Health Foundation in association with the Strabismus and Paediatric Ophthalmological Society of India (SPOSI) ended on a high note, reaching more than 1 crore people from across India including parents, teachers and children. The week-long campaign supported by ENTOD Pharmaceuticals was the first nationwide myopia awareness initiative initiated by both eye doctors and pharmaceutical industry leaders collaboratively, with a series of activities carried out across various tier-I and -II cities in India including Vadodara, Indore, Bhubaneswar, Coimbatore, Hyderabad, Chandigarh, Chennai, Jamshedpur, Guwahati, Srinagar, Anantnag and Mattan.
The primary aim of the initiative was to spread awareness of myopia and encourage parents to get their children’s eyes examined at least once a year so that they can assess the risk factors along with the myopia treatment options available in India for every stage of the disease. Many paediatric ophthalmologists were involved in the campaign to help and support the affected children.
Speaking about the success of the campaign, Mr Nikkhil K Masurkar, CEO of ENTOD Pharmaceuticals and Campaign President of National Myopia Week said “Myopia is a major public health issue in India and it will soon become a major concern if required prevention and intervention measures are not taken. Keeping this in mind, we came up with this nationwide campaign to raise awareness about this critical health issue and invite parents to check and correct their kids’ vision regularly and to adapt everyday habits accordingly. We received a really positive response from parents and consumers who engaged with the campaign content. Apart from conducting awareness across schools and hospitals in different cities, we used some of the leading platforms of national media and collaborated with more than 50 prominent mother and kids influencers to create myopia awareness. Our campaign hashtag #ThinkMyopiaSeeBetter trended in the number one position in India reaching over 72 lakh people with 91 lakh impressions. Building on this campaign’s success, we will continue our efforts to raise awareness on myopia and educate parents and caregivers to prevent the disease and slow its progression.”
In the week-long campaign, the ENTOD field teams collaborated with schools, local government organisations, parent groups, paediatric eye doctors and eye institutions to support physical myopia awareness events in more than 325 districts in India, a joint exercise involving over 1000 field representatives and 500 + ophthalmologists.
“Most children don’t notice anything is wrong with their vision until it starts to really impact their activities. That was evident from our eye check-up camps organised across different cities, especially in places like Guwahati where 20% of the kids were not aware that they had myopia because they never went for a check-up and it was never diagnosed. Myopia is a global epidemic with numbers increasing dramatically each year. The disease currently affects around one-third of the world’s population and is predicted to affect half of the world’s population by 2050. Because so few parents are familiar with myopia, it goes untreated in staggering numbers, creating barriers for children. Since there’s no cure for myopia, the only way to prevent the disease from progressing is to be properly aware and schedule a comprehensive eye exam for kids as early as possible. We are really glad to make this campaign a big success and are keen for this campaign to continue all year round to promote the importance of checking one’s vision and adopting good habits to fight myopia” said Dr. Jitendra Jethani, Paediatric ophthalmologist, Baroda Children Eye Care & Squint Clinic.
