OPC - Preserving and restoring eyesight for 40+ years

A UNIQUE APPROACH

OPC develops programs in collaboration with partner countries and their ministries of health, which have ownership of all programs and are responsible for implementation. The development and implementation of any given program goes through 4 different phases:

1) Situation Analysis & Program Planning

This stage, planned by the partners (the Ministries of Health, often the civil society in a given country and OPC), allows to

Estimate the eye health needs as per services delivered to patients by the available eye health work force
Identify the health policies needed either to be improved or to be developed
Estimate the necessary means to reaching set targets in the most efficient, effective way possible.

This step is done through a technical visit of an OPC team member followed by a national workshop supported by OPC. The purpose of this workshop is to come up with a draft program of interventions and determine the priorities of locations and level of intervention.

2) Program Approval & Fundraising

The draft program of intervention is presented to the Ministry of Health and a memorandum of understanding is signed between the Ministry and OPC, which allows OPC to start the search for funding.

3) Program Implementation

The program activities are implemented by the Ministry of Health human resources. OPC and the civil society supervise and monitor either together or individually. Accounting and finances are entrusted to independent fiduciary agents.

4) Evaluation & Recommendations

All OPC programs must end with a final evaluation led by independent experts while accounting and finances are audited by an independent entity. The final report approved by the independent experts and in accordance with the partners’ agreed upon recommendations is made available to the donor(s), the experts and auditors and to the partners.

The Challenge

According to the International Agency for Blindness Prevention latest compiled data, 253 million people are visually impaired, including 36 million blind people. The risk of blindness is 5 to 10 times higher in the developing world than in industrialized countries, and 90% of blind people live in a developing country.

Because of demographic growth and aging populations, the blindness/visual impairment statistics are at risk of tripling and doubling respectively by 2050. OPC is fighting so that this will not happen, because sustainable solutions exist to preserve a person’s right to sight.

Regardless of age, women are most at risk of blindness. When women are given quality eye care and access to sight saving surgeries, it impacts not only their lives but that of their families.

Young daughters won’t have to drop out of school to become caregivers. Women can continue their livelihoods, earning an income for their family.

Providing glasses could offer normal sight to millions of children suffering from problems like myopia and astigmatism and allow them to have a normal education.

When children complete school, they enter their communities as better equipped adults. Help break the cycle of poverty and contribute to social and economic development, empowering individuals through sustainable access to sight.

MILLION PEOPLE ARE DISTANCE VISUALLY IMPAIRED

ARE WOMEN 55%

LIVE IN LOW- AND MIDDLE-INCOME COUNTRIES 89%

MILLION BLIND PEOPLE, ACCORDING TO THE LATEST ESTIMATES FOR 2015

At OPC, we chose to be a “glass house” to explain where every dollar goes.

Of every dollar we spend, 92 cents goes to preserving and restoring eyesight of the world’s most vulnerable people.

Programs (90%)

Fundraising costs (8%)

Operating costs (2%)