Photo courtesy of Claude Ho

Meeting UN Millennium Goals

The Fred Hollows Foundation’s Dr Andreas Mueller recently spent time in Northern Ethiopia to participate in a large scale program which aims to alleviate extreme poverty in Sub-Saharan Africa.

August 2008

Dr Andreas Mueller (left) with Timmy O’Neil (right) from The Himalayan Cataract Project in Koraro village Ethiopia.

The program forms a part of the Millennium Villages Project, an initiative developed in accordance with the United Nations' Millennium Development Goals.

The Millennium Villages Project offers a bold model to overcome extreme poverty in Africa by empowering impoverished villages directly, providing targeted, proven and practical solutions to improve aspects of health, education and nutrition.

“The rate of blindness in Ethiopia is about six times higher than in most western countries,” Dr Mueller said.

“Such a high number of people blind is therefore detrimental to community development. It exacerbates extreme poverty. Multinational support is therefore imperative to face these challenges in order for the fulfillment of the Millennium Development Goals to occur.”   

The Fred Hollows Foundation teamed up with U.S. Non-Government Organisation, The Himalayan Cataract Project, to examine approximately 3,650 members of the local Millennium Village, Koraro. They found a very large amount of cataract blindness, as well as many cases of trachoma and vitamin A deficiency.

The following action was taken to help address these issues:

  • The team supplied antibiotics as well as vitamin A for all children under six years.
  • 129 cataract surgeries were performed, as well as over 100 trichiasis surgeries for trachoma.
  • Spectacles were also distributed and local nurses and community health workers received training.