Mr. Aaron Mullaniff:

On the question about the HSE, when the clinical care programme was being put together in 2017, the NCBI had no meaningful consultation or engagement on the programme. That is being straight about it. As for the primary eye care services review, which happened in parallel, we had minimal engagement on that. The issue we have as an organisation is that we are not considered from a vision rehabilitation perspective. After someone acquires a vision impairment, which could be catastrophic or gradual in nature, that individual will be referred to us, but Vision Ireland is not even considered in the clinical care pathway. If 90% of patients can benefit from vision rehabilitation but there is no clinical pathway to show what “good” looks like, that is of major concern to me as chief services officer and it is not sustainable for us as an organisation. We are not here to confront but to work with the HSE, the Department of Health and, in particular, this committee. That is why the blueprint and strategy is really important to eliminate - that is the key word – the avoidable blindness that is happening day in, day out.

On the question about lifestyle, that information is not, from a campaigns perspective, something we encounter day to day. People are not really aware of the need to know their family history or even to wear sunglasses and the risk that comes from damaging UV rays. One provider carried out about 1 million tests in 2022 and we are trying to gather data ourselves on what proportion of the population are not even having their eyes checked, and we are currently looking for that information. Again, smoking is a huge factor that people need to be mindful of, as is eating well. There are a range of measures that citizens of this State need to take on themselves.