Child Blindness

The purpose of this five-year program is to implement the Congressionally-mandated Child Blindness directive which will expand the availability, accessibility, and quality of eye care services to vulnerable children with limited access to sight-saving services.

This purpose will contribute to the overall goal of improving the health and wellbeing of children, especially those in vulnerable populations, increasing economic productivity, and advancing development.

Specific goals are: 1) to increase the number of children provided with quality eye care services; and 2) to increase global knowledge of pediatric eye care through innovation and the implementation of best practices. The program will start in late FY18.

Project inputs include sub-awards to U.S.-based and non-U.S. based eye care organizations to implement field activities and research; technical assistance to eye care organizations and to other USAID and U.S.

Government programs; capacity building and training for small eye care organizations; and technical leadership in the field of global pediatric ophthalmology through research and knowledge sharing efforts.

Project outputs include timely issuance of the maximum amount of funds to grants for field activities; strengthened capacity of grantees to meet USAID requirements and performance targets; cross-sectoral linkages and collaborations between USAID and U.S.

Government programs where appropriate; expanded innovation in child eye care programming approaches; and integration of evidence-based approaches into large-scale programming and host-country health systems.

The Child Blindness Program will promote integration of interventions into existing local health systems and other sector plans and programs (e.g., education) in order to increase long-term sustainability of results and ownership by governments and local actors, and help countries progress on their journey to self-reliance.