Eye care for elders living on tea plantations

During the summer, with funds provided by Carigest SA of Switzerland, IRIS ran an eye screening, refraction & surgery programme for elders living on tea plantations in the Central Province of Sri Lanka. People living on tea plantations are amongst the poorest of poor people and are those who continue to live in plantation accommodation having retired from working on the estates. The majority are Tamils, descendants of families brought from India as cheap labour for the island’s profitable tea and rubber plantations during the time of colonial rule.

The eye screening programme, conducted from December 2010 to August 2011, provided eye examinations for 3,746 people, gave glasses, free-of-charge, to 2,025 people and, at the time of writing, had restored the sight of 370 elders.