Mganga Herrieth, Lewallen Susan, Courtright Paul
Kilimanjaro Centre for Community Ophthalmology, Good Samaritan Foundation, Moshi, Tanzania.
Middle East Afr J Ophthalmol. 2011 Apr;18(2):98-101. doi: 10.4103/0974-9233.80695.
Globally, and in Africa, after adjusting for age, women are about 1.4 times more likely to be blind than men. While women generally live longer than men, the lack of accessibility to and use of services is likely the most important reason for excess blindness in women in Africa.
We sought to review the literature on vision loss in Africa and summarize the findings related to gender equity.
Information from across sub-Saharan Africa was collected on the evidence of gender inequity and reasons for this inequity. Finally, the results were used to generate suggestions on how gender equity could be improved.
In all published surveys (except one), cataract surgical coverage among women was lower than cataract surgical coverage among men. Although data available are limited, similar findings appeared in the use of services for other disease conditions, notably, childhood cataract and glaucoma. Evidence suggests that a variety of approaches are needed to improve the use of eye care services. Three main strategies are needed to address gender inequity in vision loss in Africa. First, it is important to address transport needs. Second, counseling of patients and family members is required. Finally, programs need to put in place pricing systems that make the services affordable the population.
VISION 2020 can be achieved in Africa, but investment is needed in a variety of strategies that will ensure that eye care services are affordable, accessible, and acceptable to women and girls.
在全球范围内以及非洲，在调整年龄因素后，女性失明的可能性比男性高约1.4倍。虽然女性通常比男性寿命更长，但缺乏获得和使用服务的机会可能是非洲女性失明人数过多的最重要原因。
我们试图回顾关于非洲视力丧失的文献，并总结与性别平等相关的研究结果。
收集了撒哈拉以南非洲各地有关性别不平等的证据及其不平等原因的信息。最后，利用这些结果就如何改善性别平等提出建议。
在所有已发表的调查中（有一项除外），女性的白内障手术覆盖率低于男性的白内障手术覆盖率。尽管现有数据有限，但在其他疾病状况（尤其是儿童白内障和青光眼）的服务使用方面也出现了类似的结果。有证据表明，需要采取多种方法来提高眼保健服务的利用率。解决非洲视力丧失方面的性别不平等问题需要三种主要策略。首先，满足交通需求很重要。其次，需要对患者及其家庭成员进行咨询。最后，项目需要建立使服务价格让民众能够承受的定价体系。
非洲能够实现“视觉2020”目标，但需要对多种策略进行投资，以确保眼保健服务对妇女和女孩来说是可承受、可获得且可接受的。
