A Manchester scientist will be returning to his continent of birth in a bid to help train young eye specialists in one of the world’s poorest countries.
Dr Vincent Nourrit, a visual optics expert at The University of Manchester, will be spending two weeks of his summer holiday teaching optometry students in the highlands of northwest Ethiopia.
The new degree course at the University of Gondar is designed to address the chronic shortage of optometrists in a country where more than one million people are blind or suffer low vision.
“It is estimated that up to 80% of this blindness is either treatable or preventable but there simply aren’t enough trained professionals to carry out the procedures,” said Vincent, who is based in Manchester’s Faculty of Life Sciences.
“This degree course – the first in the country – has been developed with a full curriculum, so the students will be able to go on and train other optometrists in the future.”
Vincent, who was born in the north western African country of Burkina Faso, will fly out to Gondar in September to teach the intensive two-week visual optics component of the course to the students.
The pioneering project, which will be expanded to another university in the south of Ethiopia next year, has been set up by UK optometrist Gemma Peters, who trained at what was formerly the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology (UMIST).
Gemma said: “The staff and students are delighted that Vincent will be coming to Gondar and we look forward to his valuable contribution to the teaching.
“Being the first optometrists to be trained in the East Africa, these students are highly motivated and hard working, but they face many challenges in this context. But with a positive attitude and the support of professionals like Vincent, the standard of training, resources and facilities will continue to improve.
“When I was first appointed by ORBIS International-Ethiopia to set up this training we had no textbooks or equipment or even a classroom. One year on, we now have an optometry clinic, a spectacle workshop with trained technicians and our own small reference library.
“For many years it has been one of my personal goals to work in development and this is why this project appeals so much to me and hopefully to others in the future.”
Vincent’s trip, which is being partly funded by the UK charity Gondar (Ethiopia) Eye Surgery (GEES), begins on Saturday (September 15) and will last until the end of the month.
For further information contact:
Aeron Haworth
Media Officer
Faculty of Life Sciences
The University of Manchester
Tel: 0161 275 8383
Mob: 07717 881563
Email: [email protected]