Provincial Funding to Support Vision Care Programs

Recognizing the importance of vision health, the Provincial Government is investing $200,000 in one-time funding to the CNIB to help the organization expand its programs and reduce wait times for services in rural Newfoundland and Labrador. The Honourable Jerome Kennedy, Minister of Health and Community Services, presented a cheque to the CNIB at its head office in St. John's today.

"Our government recognizes the importance of fostering healthy lifestyles for every resident of this province, and vision health is a vital piece of an individual's overall well-being," said Minister Kennedy. "Our support of the CNIB's programs will result in improved access to vision care service for residents in rural Newfoundland and Labrador."

The CNIB will use the provincial funding to develop a new community-based volunteer program that will provide initial, timely support to people in rural communities, particularly seniors, who are waiting for CNIB services. This program will help reduce the wait lists for those who have been referred to CNIB for vision rehabilitation services. The new program will ensure that individuals newly diagnosed with permanent vision loss will receive some timely initial assistance, which could include an introduction to CNIB library services and a demonstration of some basic assistive devices such as talking watches.

"We are very pleased that the Department of Health and Community Services understands and shares our concern about the impact vision loss is having in our province, especially among our seniors population," said Len Baker, Executive Director of CNIB, Newfoundland and Labrador Division. "This funding will enable us to better serve those who need our assistance by reducing wait times and will help to prevent blindness and vision loss."

The CNIB will also use the funding to support the launch of a new industrial eye safety program that will focus on vision health and the prevention of blindness, especially in the workplace.

"The CNIB offers an important service for people in our province who lose their eyesight or live with partial vision," said Minister Kennedy. "I'm pleased our government is able to support the good work of this organization and help make vision health services and programs more accessible to those in our province who need them the most."

CNIB provides specialized services for people of all ages, including support and training on independent living skills, assessment and training on the use of low vision aids to compensate for vision loss, safe and independent mobility both within and outside the home, access to a wide variety of consumer products, training in assistive devices, early intervention services for children and access to one of the world's largest lending libraries of books in audio, braille or e-text. CNIB challenges conventional attitudes pertaining to vision loss, delivering a progressive message about ability, not disability.

Budget 2010: The Right Investments — For Our Children and Our Future, provided a record $2.7 billion investment in health care throughout the province, aimed at improving access to services by reducing wait times, including diagnostic procedures. Today's announcement of $200,000 is in addition to an annual grant of $664,200 that the Provincial Government provides the CNIB to support rehabilitation and blindness prevention programs.

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2010 04 15                                                    2:15 p.m.