By; JACOB ONJEWU DICKSON
National Eye Centre on Friday, sensitized at least 500 cadets, officers and staff of the Nigerian Defence Academy (NDA) Afaka Mando on Glaucoma, stressing that about 1.4million Nigerians are currently affected.
Speaking during the 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 like in Panteka, in schools, in Rigachikun, in Mahuta,” Kana maintained.
The representative of the NDA Commandant, Air Vice Marshall SK Aneke who thanked Eye Centre for bringing sensitization to NDA, said, “the eye is one of the key part of the body. For us, we don’t joke with medicals, 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 or Air Force, you can’t identify what you can’t see. You can’t read what you can’t see.
“I am a pilot and I know something you need to press buttons that are very tiny, even in the army, sometimes you need to select coordinates, if you miss a digit, lives 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.” He said.
On his part, Director Administration, Bashir Hussain Muhammad who represented the acting Chief Medical Director, revealed that, “we look at our neighbours and partners who we feel can benefit from this campaign. Actually,v cadets are being screened before taken into the academy, but in the course of work and age, the eyes need care and that’s why we are targeting the aged from 40 years upwards.
“So this year, we chose Nigerian Defense Academy and came with our equipment 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,” he explained.
As part of activities, free consultation and other forms of medication were administered to officers and staff of the the Nigerian Defence Academy.
