In July the National Eye Centre in Dili opened and we have become ever closer towards making Timor Leste self sufficient in eye care services by 2015 and eradicating preventable blindness by 2020.
On 28 July 2011, Timor Leste’s President Dr Jose Ramos Horta officially opened Dili’s new national eye centre. Located next to Dili Hospital, the building was funded by Fred Hollows Foundation in Australia and New Zealand, whereas the equipment was been funded through ETEP thanks to AusAID and its generous donors.
The eye centre is comprised of several consulting rooms and an operating theatre, which allows for life changing eye surgery to be performed at any time without affecting the hospital’s busy operation schedules. More than 50 people a day could be treated here.
This was a great milestone for not only the program, but for Timor Leste’s future in eye care services.
Read more about the event in New Vision for East Timor from Surgical News Magazine.
