BLIND POPULATION TO SOAR

PARIS: The world’s blind will increase threefold from 36 million today to 115 million in 2050 as populations expand and individuals grow older, researchers said yesterday. The number of people with a moderate to severe vision impairment – only those not corrected by glasses, contact lenses or an operation – will also near triple, from about 217 million to 588 million over the same period. Most of those affected live in Africa and Asia, a team wrote in The Lancet Global Health journal. – AFP