A few historical facts

• After many years of wars and draughts , in 1993 Ethiopia was plunged into poverty . with few resources to improve its situation.

  It was in the summer of that year that some Spanish opthalmologist doctors arrived at Mekelle, in the region of Tigray, Northern Ethiopia.

  In the midst of the desolation they encountered a group of Daughter of Charity nuns,who, headed by Sister Margaret , a woman of great fortitude , had installed a tiny dispensary, the St.Louise Eye Clinic. Here surgery was performed on thousands of patients suffering from blindness brought on by trachoma.
  The following year the Spanish opthalmologists , having very few means at their disposal decided to perform the first cataract surgeries.

  The collaboration agreement between the Spanish doctors and Sister Margaret took shape and Dr.Julio de la Cámara with a team of competent ophthalmologists founded the Proyecto Visión Association in 1995. The association’s project was to fight against avoidable blindness from a standard of excellence and in a sustainable manner.

  Since then , Proyecto Visión has worked with volunteers only , both for its management and in the medical field. The beneficiary population at present is of around six hundred thousand there being no discrimination from the point of view of class, gender or age.
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  Proyecto Visión is financed by its members and collaborators, and has also benefited from some grants and prizes awarded to our track record.

  Proyecto Visión’s local counterpart have always been the Daughters of Charity. However, in order to consolidate our care , training and prevention projects our association has signed several agreements in the course of these years with the Regional Tigray Health Bureau and with Qwiha University.

  For over twenty years now Proyecto Visión has been working regularly , performing up to one thousand cataract surgeries a year at St.Louise Eye Clinic . We have also updated the clinic’s operating theatre and all its installations, introduced the Opthalmic Medical Assistant (OMA) degree, created a school for these nurses and provided them with jobs, We have as well financed an opthalmological hospital in Qwiha, and set up an opthalmological operating theatre in Adigrat. We have collaborated in several prevention programmes , the S,A.F.E. programme for the distribution of antibiotics, we have drilled wells in order to supply wàter to the population and run awaredness raising programmes on hygiene at schools and churches.

  .Ethiopia has changed sinced 1995. Public health has improved and the needs at St.Louise Clinic have also been changing in the course of these years. Proyect Visión has adapted to these changes , always with a great sense of responsability and at all times, respecting the requests and needs of our counterpart.

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