Lions project will offer full eye care

Since 1992 the Lions Club has been providing eye care to Belizeans who simply cannot afford to go to private clinics. But traditionally, that care has not included major surgery. All that should soon change however, thanks to new initiative.

Jacqueline Woods, Reporting

The Belize City Lions Club will receive two hundred and sixty thousand U.S dollars from Lions International. The money will be used to establish a project entitled “Sight First”, this entails the completion of a facility which will provide all levels of eye care, from a simple examination to cataract and glaucoma operations. However, not all Belizeans will be able to receive the services.

Lester Young, Adminstrator, Sight First Project

“They’ll have primary, secondary and tertiary eye care now available to them at a reasonable price. We are not catering to The middle and upper class people we are catering to the lower class of people.”

The facility will be located at the Lions Clinic on Princess Margaret Drive and will be jointly managed by the Belize City Lions Club, the Belize Council For the Visually Impaired and the Government of Belize. The grant will be used to upgrade the existing building to include an operating theatre and finish the construction of a ten-room hostel.

Lester Young

“This is where our main push is going to be to concentrate on finishing the building we started some years ago and furnish it and open it to the patients.”

Reporting for News Five. I am Jacqueline Woods.

The First Sight Facility is scheduled to open in April.