Background

• Visual defects are one of the most common causes of disability in the world.
  
  
• The World Health Organisation (WHO) defines 'profound blindness' as the inability to count fingers at a distance of ten feet or less.
  
  
• Partial sight is more difficult to define, but the WHO defines 'severe low vision' as the inability to count fingers at 20 feet or less.
  
  
• Many different eye defects and diseases can give rise to visual impairment. In Britain the most common are macular degeneration, diabetic retinopathy, glaucoma and cataracts.
  
  
• Different eye conditions create different problems. Very few blind people see nothing at all. A minority can distinguish light but nothing else. Some have no central vision; others have no side vision. Some see everything as a vague blur; others see a patchwork of blank and defined areas.
  
  
• The incidents of many eye conditions increases with age, and because of the ageing of the population the total numbers of people with vision loss can be expected to increase substantially over the coming years.
  
  
• Some blind people carry a short white stick (like a white walking stick). This is called a symbol cane and is mainly intended to indicate to other people that they cannot see very well. Other blind people may use a long cane to scan the area in front of them and find obstacles at low level, but only around 4% of blind and partially sighted people have had long cane mobility training.
  
  
• Only a minority of blind people have a guide dog (there are around 100 working guide dogs in Northern Ireland at present). Many blind people will not use any mobility aid, and will rely instead on their residual vision. However, many of these people will find it difficult to move around independently in this way. It is a myth that blind people develop a 'sixth sense' to compensate for their loss of sight.

For Deafblind people : See section on People who are Deaf and Hard of Hearing