Overview

IRIS is a Swiss-based international NGO working in the field of prevention of blindness and restoration of sight. The aims of the organization are to improve health amongst the poorest of the poor, particularly those living in remote, rural areas of Cambodia. IRIS has no political or religious affiliations. International Resources for the Improvement of Sight is a small, independent, charity, founded in 1996 by Michele Claudel and John Stewart. It specializes in prevention of blindness and restoration of sight. The organization’s name is commonly abbreviated IRIS, but later it was changed to IRIS ASIA as a result of the organization’s geographical focus.

Background

IRIS was established in 1995 to respond to the lack of eye care facilities and services available to the poor in Cambodia. In 1996, IRIS resourced an annual outreach eye care program that sent eye doctors and nurses into remote rural areas to provide surgery on individuals who had become unnecessarily blind as a result of cataracts or other eye conditions. In 1998, IRIS built, equipped and staffed Cambodia's first provincial eye clinic, in Kampong Cham town, Kampong Cham province. Since 1996, IRIS has conducted eye screening of 59,000 people and performed over 11,000 eye operations. From January 2004, in an effort to promote the localization of services, IRIS will hand over the management and operation of its activities to the Ministry of Health. IRIS will continue to tackle the prevention of blindness and restoration of sight in Cambodia through subsidizing 1500 eye operations every year, by resourcing an outreach eye screening program in Kampong Cham Province and through traning health centre staff and village health volunteers in primary eye care education. IRIS works in close cooperation with the Ministry of Health's National Sub-Committee for the Prevention of Blindness. IRIS was established in response to eye care needs identified amongst the poor in Cambodia. Over the years, financial support has been extended to eye care development programs in Nepal, Lao PDR and Sri Lanka and to programs administered by other charities in Northern India and border camps in Thailand. The organization is a part of VISION 2020, a global initiative of the World Health Organization (WHO) and the International Agency for the Prevention of Blindness (IAPB), for the elimination of avoidable blindness. IRIS also has links with ‘Association Ganesha Suisse-Nepal’ (www.associationganesha.org) which is developing education programs in Barmaghiya, Saptari District, and with ‘Vision for All’ (www.visionforall.ch), a Swiss-based Foundation that has been developing eye care services in Nepal, India, the Congo, Egypt and Albania.

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