About 315 million people in the world are visually impaired of which 46 million are blind and this year the focus is on eye health and access to care. Globally visual impairment is most common among men and women 50 years of age and older. The majority of eye conditions are cataracts and can easily be treated. However in some parts of the world there is still a disparity among eye care for men vs. women. It is interesting to note that 88% of the world's visually impaired live in developing countries. In the USA there are approximately 96,000 blind or visually impaired children under the age of 19. Correction of refractive errors could restore vision to more than 12 million children under the age of 5. Also interesting fact is about 85% of visual impairment is avoidable globally. There are some positive trends showing reduced rates of visual impairments worldwide with the reduction of infectious diseases. However, there is an increase in the number of people becoming blind or visually impaired do to longer life expectancies. So who is at risk other than the aging population? Children! Child blindness still remains a significant problem especially in developing countries. 1.4 million children below the age of 15 unfortunately will live in blindness for many years some of which can be corrected. According to the WHO/Prevention of Blindness 85% of all visual impairment and 75% of blindness could be prevented or even cured worldwide. Vitamin A deficiency is just one of the causes of blindness. For more information about this problem contact the World Health Organization [URL="http://who.int/"]http://who.int/[/URL] The Blind Judo Foundation [URL="http://www.blindjudofoundation.org"]http://www.blindjudofoundation.org[/URL] introduces blind and visually impaired children, young adults and blind / visually impaired military personnel to the sport of Judo. Judo is one of those sports adapted to the blind and visually impaired. Follow the Foundation at [URL="http://twitter.com/blindjudo"]http://twitter.com/blindjudo[/URL]