Helping the visually impaired

Posted on Nov 27, 2015 by Rob McBroom

Did you know that, according to the WHO, "China accounts for nearly 18% of the world's blind?" This amounts to about five million people in China alone, which is a staggering number. The thing is, many of us take our vision for granted and would likely struggle to get through a day without vision.

Life in China is already hard for many, which makes living with severe vision impairment even tougher. While there have been incredible advances in medical care and treatment for many of the common causes of visual impairment, many of these treatments focus on either restoring vision or slowing vision degradation. This certainly helps people lead better lives, but medical care can only go so far.

Because we rely so heavily on our vision, it can be mentally devastating to lose it, and for many visually impaired, mental health is probably just as or more important than any medical care. In fact, according to an article published in Mental Healthy, more than a third of people with visual impairment suffer from depression.   

Unfortunately, depression is not the only mental health related issue many blind people can suffer from. Unite for Sight has listed both anxiety and social withdrawal as common among people with vision loss or blindness.

Here at Pacific Prime China we believe that every person has the right to positive mental health, so we recently helped out an important charity event hosted by the Suzhou Little Red Cap Volunteers Association.

About the event

Sport is an important part of many people's lives, and while people with full vision can pretty much participate in almost any sport they wish, those with vision impairment are often limited in the activities they can partake in. Because sport and activity is a great way to help people with mental health issues, Pacific Prime feels that this was the perfect event to sponsor.

This year the Suzhou Little Red Cap Volunteers Association put on their third-annual Fun Games for the Visually Impaired & the Healthy, which was started to help give blind and visually impaired people a barrier-free sport experience.

According to the charity, this event has helped more than 500 people experience sport in a way they never thought possible before. We were happy to be a sponsor of the event in 2015, and hope to continue to do so for years to come.   

About Suzhou Little Red Cap Volunteers Association

The Suzhou Little Red Cap Volunteers Association started as a branch of the Suzhou Charity website in 2004. This group of volunteers met on the site's forum (http://bbs.szgy.org.cn) and in 2008 was officially designated as a charity group. Today, the group has grown to over 16 thousand people and helped more than 180 thousand individuals including many blind and vision impaired citizens of Suzhou.

To learn more about Pacific Prime China's initiatives, please stay tuned to our blog.