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Children's Eye Health Education Program in Outback Communities

About the Program

The Children's Eye Health Education Program in Outback Communities is a collaborative national initiative to help improve eye health outcomes for children in rural and outback communities of Australia who experience less than equitable access to healthcare. Indigenous children are an important part of this group.

Centre for Eye Research Australia (CERA) and Merck Sharp & Dohme are proud to announce a partnership to help reduce preventable vision loss in outback Australia through improved eye health education. The program seeks to increase the chances of early diagnosis and treatment. It will complement other work CERA is undertaking to better understand the causes and consequences of childhood vision loss in outback and Indigenous communities.

Providing leadership to address the challenges of outback services in eye health, the program will work directly with local health, education and community service providers throughout Australia.

Materials are now available and will include a poster and a brochure as well as colouring sheets for school children. The materials will be very simple for effective communication and delivery to children/parents/healthcare workers across rural and remote Australia.

CERA is proud to have the support of Merck Sharp & Dohme, one of Australia’s largest prescription pharmaceutical companies with a long history of helping people in resource-poor settings. In 2007 Merck Sharp & Dohme celebrated the 20th anniversary of the Mectizan Donation Program, the longest running medical donation program in history which aims to eradicate river blindness around the world.