Health Ministry to pilot ‘Snap on spectacles’ in remote areas to improve access to eye care services

The Ministry of Health is working along with a group of persons from Hopkinson University to pilot a Community Ophthalmology Programme in Guyana for 2022. This was disclosed by the Minister of Health Dr Frank Anthony during his daily COVID-19 update on Monday. Dr Anthony explained that this initiative will allow the ministry to pilot the ‘Snap-on spectacles’ programme in remote areas across the country. “So what it does, you go into a community, you’re able to test everybody’s eye very quickly and based on the results of the test you can give them a spectacle and that’s done in less than 10 minutes,” the Health Minister explained. According to Anthony, this programme will make a great impact on persons living in remote areas. “We have ordered 3500 such spectacles and the programme is going to be started in remote areas because, in a lot of instances, these persons do not have the opportunity of getting such service,” Minister Anthony stated. Once the programme is deemed successful the ministry will be looking to expand to other services. “So we’ll pilot it and if it works well then we’ll move that to other areas, so we’re starting that with a pilot this year,” he said.