Fiona Phillips fronts new campaign aiming to improve eye care in Zambia

TV presenter Fiona Phillips is fronting a new campaign to give millions of people across Zambia access to proper eye care. While here in the UK we take vision for granted, in countries such as Zambia as many as a quarter of people are estimated to suffer from some sort of vision problem - from simple sight difficulties and the need for prescription glasses, to cataracts, glaucoma and blindness.

In a population of 12 million there are just a handful of optometrists offering eye care, all of them in private practice, which is beyond the means of all but the elite. People are forced to walk for miles to attend a clinic in the hope of receiving help.

For the impoverished people in developing countries, not being able to see makes it extremely difficult to work. Children whose parents have vision difficulties have to stay at home to care for the family and miss out on an education. Good sight can literally mean the difference between life and death.

Last year, the Specsavers Giving Sight to Africa project helped Vision Aid Overseas raise £250,000 to build Zambia’s first School of Optometry in the capital Lusaka, where optometrists, refractionists, dispensers and glazing technicians will be trained to deliver eye care services when it opens in 2010.

This year, with the help of Fiona Phillips, the eye care company is looking to raise £300,000 to build more outreach clinics in the country’s eight other provinces, to ensure that eye care is available to everyone – not just those who live near the capital. Such is the commitment of the Zambian government to this project that they have agreed to match the funds raised.

Fiona Phillips has already travelled to Zambia to see the difference the project has made, and will front a documentary about the School when construction is completed.

She says, “The difference that something as simple as glasses can make to a person in a developing country is tremendous. We take eye care for granted because it is readily available on every high street but to the people of Zambia for example, it might mean that they can see their child for the first time, or that they can return to work to fend for their family, which they have been unable to do because they cannot see properly. It can be truly life changing.”

For more information visit vao.org.uk or to support via Specsavers log onto specsavers.co.uk to find your nearest store.