Tej Kohli Cornea Institute (TKCI), along with world-renowned LV Prasad Eye Institute, has laid out a plan to control global corneal blindness by 2030. The five year acceleration aims to relieve the impact of sight impairment caused on economic growth in developing countries. The foundation has committed itself to a programme of corneal education and care in India and its partnership with the LVPEI comes as its part.
Tej Kohli, Chairman of Kohli Ventures and founder of the Tej Kohli Foundation, said, “Alongside world-class technology and expertise, we now have a programme of education and training, eye research, product development and a global network of resource centres, which makes it possible to extend our vision to control corneal blindness across the globe by 2030.” The Foundation was founded in 2005 by Tej Kohli and his wife Wendy as an autonomous, non-profit organisation with the initial goal of helping disadvantaged children. Its areas of work include treating and preventing corneal blindness, offering midday meals for malnourished children, vocational training for the physically disabled, improving the health of rural communities, and empowering women.
“Corneal blindness and diseases causing it have been on the radar of corneal surgeons for years but with the focus and funding brought in by TKCI, controlling needless blindness by 2030 has for the first time, started to sound like a reality,” Pravin Vaddavalli, Director, Tej Kohli Cornea Institute, said. The TKCI and LVPEI are together working on a network of cornea institutes regionally and eventually around the world.
