Egyptian Trachoma disease

In my life I could experience many wonderful things and see a lot of the world by travelling and longer stays abroad, among those were also sad things. Since my professional focus is on well-aging and therefore beauty, it is important to me, that we, who are living in a well off world, to become aware of beauty being something very individual, which lays in the eye of the beholder and has in the first place something to do with health, optimal function and emotional balance. Our sense organs absorb beauty in a lot of ways, which makes life worth living. Even worse, when we take these things for granted, are not guaranteed anymore because of poverty and special conditions of life.

In 1998 I had my first contact with people, who suffer of the Egyptian trachoma disease. Even more affected as by the catastrophic medical condition, I was by the fact that this disease can be alleviated with a small financial expense and can be even cured. Without any treatment, the disease of a chronic conjunctivitis leads to blindness and deprives the people of their beauty and the possibility to see beauty in the world.

Please help to release the affected people from this insidious disease, which is so easy to cure. With only a small contribution, you can give beauty and emotions, which allow experiencing real beauty with the eyes.

The trachoma is a bacterial conjunctivitis, which is caused by the “Chlamydia trachomatis” agent of different serotypes A, B, Ba and C. Due to repeating infections of the conjunctiva scars appear. The infected people suffer mostly from trichiasis, resulting inward growing eyelashes, which is followed by a corneal opacity due to the rubbing eyelashes on the corneal surface and eventually they go blind.

With 500 million infected people, the trachoma is the most common eye disease worldwide. Currently, 6 million people have gone blind. Children are mostly affected by this disease. In the hyper-endemic areas, the risk of an infestation goes up to nearly 100 percent of the population. The contagious disease is mostly found in areas with dry and hot climate, large poverty, high population density, water scarcity and accordingly poor hygiene conditions.

To save the eyesight of an affected person in stage I or II with the use of antibiotics, it only needs 5 Euro. Surgery costs can be already covered from 20 Euro.

The private initiative “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder” collects donations worldwide for fighting the Egyptian trachoma disease.