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Show Proper Eye Care Can Prevent Half Of All Blindness By Franklin M. Foote, M.D. Executive Director, Nallonal Society for the Prevention of Blindness It isn't very likely to happen, of course, but just suppose someone offered you a blank check for your eyes. Would you fill out the check? And if you did, how much money would you want for a life of darkness? dark-ness? Without a doubt, some people wouldn't trade their eyes for a sum equal to the national debt. And for those who did sell their sight, the price would come awfully high to the bidder. Nevertheless, in our day-in, day-out day-out lives, many of us hold sight as a very cheap commodity. For example, ex-ample, have you had your eyes checked recently? If you own a car you've probably had a mechanic me-chanic examine it at least once during the past 12 months. But what is the price you paid for your car compared to the price you would place on your eyes if you could fill in that blank check? Children Need Eye Care Moreover, if you don't take care of your automobile, your worst fate is an extra-large bill for the garage. ga-rage. If you don't take proper care of your eyes, the result may be life-long darkness. Each week blindness descends in 420 American homes. We at the National Society for the Prevention of Blindness have discovered that from 50 to 75 per cent of all these cases of blindness could be prevented pre-vented by proper use of the knowledge knowl-edge which medical science now possesses. Sight conservation should begin be-gin with our children. Has your child had a visual checkup check-up recently? He should have one periodically for this reason: rea-son: one of every four American Ameri-can children is suffering from some type of eye defect, but nothing is done to correct the condition. We've also discovered that man) 'lildren who come home with poo ?port cards are plagued by poor ;sion rather than poor I. Q. It n't surprising because 85 per cent f what we learn comes through our vision. Adults, of course, need their sight just as much as youngsters. Men and women over 40 should be especially es-pecially punctual about having periodic pe-riodic eye checks. Special Sight-Saving Classes The sight of an estimated 53.000 American school children is so poor that they cannot read this page. Eight thousand of these children are now in special sight-saving classes. In these classes the children use books and other reading matter printed in large-size type, thus conserving con-serving whatever sight they have. They only attend these classes for work requiring close use of the eyes. |