RPB Supports Campaign to Protect Vision Research for All Americans

Sight feels permanent—until it isn’t. Let’s not wait to value the science that protects it.

Research to Prevent Blindness (RPB) is proud to support efforts by the nation’s vision community to ramp up its defense of the National Eye Institute (NEI), part of the National Institutes of Health, and its 57-year track record of progress, amid mounting threats to slash federal vision funding. Today, stakeholders launched the #SeeWhatMatters campaign, an educational and grassroots advocacy effort to elevate the profile of federally funded vision research.

The American Academy of Ophthalmology, Association of University Professors of Ophthalmology, American Academy of Optometry, Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology, and National Alliance for Eye and Vision Research (NAEVR) and Alliance for Eye and Vision Research (AEVR) launched the #SeeWhatMatters campaign to reinforce the critical need to keep NEI independent (rather than rolling eye disease research into an institute for brain and neuroscience, thereby reducing the focus on vision), and to demonstrate the human impact of discoveries in vision science. RPB has provided key support for this effort.

Funding decisions made today, determine who gets to see tomorrow…

Now is not the time to diminish or defund the NEI. As our population ages, nearly every American will personally face a visual disease or disorder.

Adequately funding the NEI can prevent billions of dollars in expenditures across Medicare and Medicaid, private insurance and family care costs. Vision loss is expected to cost the U.S. economy nearly $200 billion in 2025 alone through direct medical expenses and lost productivity. Even more importantly, protecting vision improves quality of life for individuals and families. When we lose sight, we lose more than vision; we lose connection and independence.

Before treatments were available, the National Eye Institute funded the research to create them…

Here are just a few examples of how NEI support for research (along with complementary support from RPB and others) has changed eyecare recently:

• NEI funding paved the way for the first vision-restoring treatment for age-related macular degeneration (AMD). AMD is a leading cause of vision loss in older adults, affecting 20 million people in the U.S. – a number that continues to grow rapidly as our population ages. This powerful class of drugs, called anti-VEGFs, stop vision loss in more than 90 percent of patients with AMD and improves vision in about one-third.

• NEI-supported scientists have used gene therapy to partially restore lost vision – for the very first time – to people with a blinding disease that begins in childhood, called Leber’s congenital amaurosis. NEI-funded researchers are now moving rapidly to develop gene therapy approaches for a range of inherited retinal diseases, such as retinitis pigmentosa. Inherited retinal diseases can be caused by changes in more than 270 genes, causing a wide variety of blinding conditions. While it sounds like science fiction to be able to correct and reverse vision loss, it’s reality thanks to decades of investment in vision research.

• NEI research powered the development of a high-tech non-invasive imaging technology (ocular coherence tomography) that has revolutionized treatment of several blinding eye diseases and saved both Medicare and patients billions of dollars.

“Since its establishment in 1968 as an institute independent of brain research, the NEI has proven how federal investments in vision science transform lives and lower long-term healthcare costs,” said Dan Ignaszewski, Executive Director of NAEVR/AEVR. “As proposals to fold NEI into broader neuroscience grow, the #SeeWhatMatters campaign is a call to action to protect sight-saving science and keep vision research a national priority.”

The continuity of NEI-funded research is essential to creating new treatments and cures for sight-threatening conditions, which are predicted to rise exponentially as our population ages.

Vision loss does not discriminate; everyone is at risk for a future eye disease and everyone can benefit from the work of the NEI…

We invite everyone (researchers, doctors, patients, family members, and more) to participate in the #SeeWhatMatters campaign. Learn more, explore the tools, and share your voice by visiting #SeeWhatMatters.org.

Speaking up for vision research now will protect the future of sight-saving treatments and cures.