Global estimates on the number of people blind or visually impaired by cataract: a meta-analysis from 2000 to 2020

Konrad Pesudovs; Van Charles Lansingh; John H Kempen; Ian Tapply; Arthur G Fernandes; Maria V Cicinelli; Alessandro Arrigo; Nicolas Leveziel; Paul Svitil Briant; Theo Vos; Serge Resnikoff; Hugh R Taylor; Tabassom Sedighi; Seth Flaxman; Jaimie Steinmetz; Rupert Bourne; Vision Loss Expert Group of the Global Burden of Disease Study; GBD 2019 Blindness and Vision Impairment Collaborators

doi:10.1038/s41433-024-02961-1

Global estimates on the number of people blind or visually impaired by cataract: a meta-analysis from 2000 to 2020

Eye (Lond). 2024 Mar 9. doi: 10.1038/s41433-024-02961-1. Online ahead of print.

Authors

Konrad Pesudovs¹, Van Charles Lansingh^{2

3

4}, John H Kempen^{5

6

7}, Ian Tapply⁸, Arthur G Fernandes⁹, Maria V Cicinelli¹⁰, Alessandro Arrigo¹¹, Nicolas Leveziel¹², Paul Svitil Briant¹³, Theo Vos¹³, Serge Resnikoff^{14

15}, Hugh R Taylor¹⁶, Tabassom Sedighi¹⁷, Seth Flaxman¹⁸, Jaimie Steinmetz^#⁹, Rupert Bourne^#^{4

12}; Vision Loss Expert Group of the Global Burden of Disease Study; GBD 2019 Blindness and Vision Impairment Collaborators

Collaborators

Konrad Pesudovs, Van Charles Lansingh, John H Kempen, Ian Tapply, Arthur G Fernandes, Maria Vittoria Cicinelli, Alessandro Arrigo, Nicolas Leveziel, Serge Resnikoff, Hugh R Taylor, Tabassom Sedighi, Mukkharram M Bikbov, Tasanee Braithwaite, Alain Bron, Ching-Yu Cheng, Monte A Del Monte, Joshua R Ehrlich, Leon B Ellwein, David Friedman, João M Furtado, Gus Gazzard, Ronnie George, M Elizabeth Hartnett, Jost B Jonas, Rim Kahloun, Moncef Khairallah, Rohit C Khanna, Janet Leasher, Julie-Anne Little, Vinay Nangia, Michal Nowak, Tunde Peto, Pradeep Ramulu, Fotis Topouzis, Mitiadis Tsilimbaris, Ya Xing Wang, Ningli Wang, Rupert Bourne, Konrad Pesudovs, Van Charles Lansingh, John H Kempen, Ian Tapply, Arthur G Fernandes, Maria Vittoria Cicinelli, Alessandro Arrigo, Nicolas Leveziel, Theo Vos, Serge Resnikoff, Tabassom Sedighi, Seth Flaxman, Yohannes Habtegiorgis Abate, Mohammad Abdollahi, Mozhan Abdollahi, Ayele Mamo Abebe, Olumide Abiodun, Richard Gyan Aboagye, Woldu Aberhe Abrha, Hasan Abualruz, Hiwa Abubaker Ali, Eman Abu-Gharbieh, Salahdein Aburuz, Tadele Girum Girum Adal, Mesafint Molla Adane, Isaac Yeboah Addo, Qorinah Estiningtyas Sakilah Adnani, Muhammad Sohail Afzal, Shahin Aghamiri, Bright Opoku Ahinkorah, Aqeel Ahmad, Sajjad Ahmad, Ali Ahmadi, Ayman Ahmed, Haroon Ahmed, Ahmad Samir Alfaar, Abid Ali, Syed Shujait Shujait Ali, Awais Altaf, Hubert Amu, Sofia Androudi, Rodrigo Anguita, Abhishek Anil, Saeid Anvari, Anayochukwu Edward Anyasodor, Francis Appiah, Jalal Arabloo, Mosab Arafat, Damelash Areda, Reza Arefnezhad, Brhane Berhe Aregawi, Akeza Awealom Asgedom, Tahira Ashraf, Seyyed Shamsadin Athari, Bantalem Tilaye Tilaye Atinafu, Maha Moh'd Wahbi Atout, Alok Atreya, Haleh Ayatollahi, Ahmed Y Azzam, Hassan Babamohamadi, Sara Bagherieh, Yogesh Bahurupi, Atif Amin Baig, Biswajit Banik, Mainak Bardhan, Saurav Basu, Kavita Batra, Nebiyou Simegnew Bayileyegn, Fatemeh Bazvand, Addisu Shunu Beyene, Devidas S Bhagat, Akshaya Srikanth Bhagavathula, Pankaj Bhardwaj, Sonu Bhaskar, Jasvinder Singh Bhatti, Mukharram Bikbov, Niloufar Bineshfar, Marina G Birck, Veera R Bitra, Tasanee Braithwaite, Katrin Burkart, Yasser Bustanji, Zahid A Butt, Florentino Luciano Caetano Dos Santos, Luis Alberto Cámera, Vera L A Carneiro, Muthia Cenderadewi, Eeshwar K Chandrasekar, Vijay Kumar Chattu, Nitin Chitranshi, Hitesh Chopra, Dinh-Toi Chu, Kaleb Coberly, João M Coelho, Natália Cruz-Martins, Omid Dadras, Xiaochen Dai, Subasish Das, Ana Maria Dascalu, Mohsen Dashti, Maedeh Dastmardi, Berecha Hundessa Demessa, Biniyam Demisse, Diriba Dereje, Awoke Masrie Asrat Derese, Nikolaos Dervenis, Vinoth Gnana Chellaiyan Devanbu, Thanh Chi Do, Thao Huynh Phuong Do, Francisco Winter Dos Santos Figueiredo, Arkadiusz Marian Dziedzic, Hisham Atan Edinur, Ferry Efendi, Joshua R Ehrlich, Michael Ekholuenetale, Temitope Cyrus Ekundayo, Iman El Sayed, Muhammed Elhadi, Mohammad Hassan Emamian, Mehdi Emamverdi, Azin Etemadimanesh, Adeniyi Francis Fagbamigbe, Ayesha Fahim, Hossein Farrokhpour, Ali Fatehizadeh, Alireza Feizkhah, Lorenzo Ferro Desideri, Getahun Fetensa, Florian Fischer, Ali Forouhari, Matteo Foschi, Kayode Raphael Fowobaje, Abhay Motiramji Gaidhane, Aravind P Gandhi, Miglas W W Gebregergis, Mesfin Gebrehiwot, Brhane Gebremariam, Urge Gerema, Fariba Ghassemi, Sherief Ghozy, Mahaveer Golechha, Pouya Goleij, Bárbara Niegia Garcia Goulart, Shi-Yang Guan, Zewdie Gudisa, Sapna Gupta, Veer Bala Gupta, Vivek Kumar Gupta, Arvin Haj-Mirzaian, Aram Halimi, Shahin Hallaj, Samer Hamidi, Mehdi Harorani, Hamidreza Hasani, Demisu Zenbaba Heyi, Nguyen Quoc Hoan, Ramesh Holla, Sung Hwi Hong, Mehdi Hosseinzadeh, Chengxi Hu, John J Huang, Hong-Han Huynh, Segun Emmanuel Ibitoye, Irena M Ilic, Mustapha Immurana, Md Rabiul Islam, Sheikh Mohammed Shariful Islam, Chidozie C D Iwu, Louis Jacob, Ammar Abdulrahman Jairoun, Manthan Dilipkumar Janodia, Shubha Jayaram, Har Ashish Jindal, Mohammad Jokar, Nitin Joseph, Charity Ehimwenma Joshua, Vidya Kadashetti, Laleh R Kalankesh, Rohollah Kalhor, Sagarika Kamath, Himal Kandel, Rami S Kantar, Ibraheem M Karaye, Hengameh Kasraei, Soujanya Kaup, Navjot Kaur, Rimple Jeet Kaur, Gbenga A Kayode, Yousef Saleh Khader, Himanshu Khajuria, Rovshan Khalilov, Mahalaqua Nazli Khatib, Adnan Kisa, Soewarta Kosen, Ai Koyanagi, Kewal Krishan, Mukhtar Kulimbet, Nithin Kumar, Om P Kurmi, Chandrakant Lahariya, Tuo Lan, Iván Landires, Janet L Leasher, Munjae Lee, Seung Won Lee, Wei-Chen Lee, Stephen S Lim, Julie-Anne Little, Preetam Bhalchandra Mahajan, Sandeep B Maharaj, Alireza Mahmoudi, Razzagh Mahmoudi, Kashish Malhotra, Tauqeer Hussain Mallhi, Vahid Mansouri, Emmanuel Manu, Roy Rillera Marzo, Andrea Maugeri, Colm McAlinden, Wondwosen Mebratu, Tesfahun Mekene Meto, Yang Meng, Abera M Mersha, Tomislav Mestrovic, Le Huu Nhat Minh, Awoke Misganaw, Manish Mishra, Sanjeev Misra, Nouh Saad Mohamed, Soheil Mohammadi, Mustapha Mohammed, Hoda Mojiri-Forushani, Ali H Mokdad, Hossein Molavi Vardanjani, Mohammad Ali Moni, Fateme Montazeri, Maryam Moradi, Rohith Motappa, Parsa Mousavi, Admir Mulita, Christopher J L Murray, Ganesh R Naik, Gurudatta Naik, Shumaila Nargus, Zuhair S Natto, Biswa Prakash Nayak, Mohammad Negaresh, Hadush Negash, Dang H Nguyen, Phat Tuan Nguyen, Van Thanh Nguyen, Robina Khan Niazi, Osaretin Christabel Okonji, Andrew T Olagunju, Matthew Idowu Olatubi, Michal Ordak, Uchechukwu Levi Osuagwu, Nikita Otstavnov, Mayowa O Owolabi, Jagadish Rao Padubidri, Ashok Pandey, Georgios D Panos, Shahina Pardhan, Seoyeon Park, Jay Patel, Shrikant Pawar, Prince Peprah, Ionela-Roxana Petcu, Alireza Peyman, Hoang Tran Pham, Mohsen Pourazizi, Nguyen Khoi Quan, Fakher Rahim, Vafa Rahimi-Movaghar, Mohammad Hifz Ur Rahman, Sathish Rajaa, Shakthi Kumaran Ramasamy, Premkumar Ramasubramani, Shubham Ranjan, Mohammad-Mahdi Rashidi, Rama Shankar Rath, Annisa Utami Rauf, Salman Rawaf, Amirmasoud Rayati Damavandi, Elrashdy Moustafa Mohamed Redwan, Priyanka Roy, Koushik Roy Pramanik, Zahra Saadatian, Siamak Sabour, Basema Saddik, Umar Saeed, Sare Safi, Sher Zaman Safi, Amene Saghazadeh, Fatemeh Saheb Sharif-Askari, Amirhossein Sahebkar, Mohammad Ali Sahraian, Joseph W Sakshaug, Mohamed A Saleh, Sara Samadzadeh, Yoseph Leonardo Samodra, Vijaya Paul Samuel, Abdallah M Samy, Aswini Saravanan, Siddharthan Selvaraj, Farbod Semnani, Sabyasachi Senapati, Yashendra Sethi, Seyed Arsalan Seyedi, Allen Seylani, Amira A Shaheen, Samiah Shahid, Moyad Jamal Shahwan, Masood Ali Shaikh, Sunder Sham, Muhammad Aaqib Shamim, Mohammed Shannawaz, Bereket Beyene Shashamo, Maryam Shayan, Aminu Shittu, Ivy Shiue, K M Shivakumar, Seyed Afshin Shorofi, Migbar Mekonnen Sibhat, Emmanuel Edwar Siddig, Juan Carlos Silva, Jasvinder A Singh, Paramdeep Singh, Eirini Skiadaresi, Yonatan Solomon, Raúl A R C Sousa, Chandrashekhar T Sreeramareddy, Vladimir I Starodubov, Mohana Devi Subramaniam, Sri Susanty, Seyyed Mohammad Tabatabaei, Birhan Tsegaw Taye, Gebrehiwot Teklay, Mohamad-Hani Temsah, Dufera Rikitu Terefa, Jansje Henny Vera Ticoalu, Temesgen Mohammed Toma, Aristidis Tsatsakis, Guesh Mebrahtom Tsegay, Munkhtuya Tumurkhuu, Biruk Shalmeno Tusa, Sree Sudha Ty, Chukwudi S Ubah, Muhammad Umair, Tungki Pratama Umar, Rohollah Valizadeh, Jef Van den Eynde, Stephanie Louise Watson, Tewodros Eshete Wonde, Guadie Sharew Wondimagegn, Hong Xiao, Yao Yao, Iman Yazdani Nia, Arzu Yiğit, Yazachew Yismaw, Dong Keon Yon, Naohiro Yonemoto, Yuyi You, Chuanhua Yu, Mikhail Sergeevich Zastrozhin, Hanqing Zhao, Makan Ziafati, Magdalena Zielińska, Yossef Teshome Zikarg, Mohammad Zoladl, Jaimie D Steinmetz, Rupert Bourne

Affiliations

¹ University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW, Australia. k.pesudovs@unsw.edu.au.
² Department of Research, Instituto Mexicano de Oftalmología, Queretaro, Mexico.
³ Chief Medical Office, Help Me See, Jersey City, NJ, USA.
⁴ Department of Public Health Sciences, University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, Miami, FL, USA.
⁵ Department of Ophthalmology, Massachusetts Eye and Ear and Harvard Medical School Schepens Eye Research Institute, Boston, MA, USA.
⁶ MCM Eye Unit, MyungSung Christian Medical Center (MCM) Multispecialty Hospital and MyungSung Medical School, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
⁷ Department of Ophthalmology, Faculty of Medicine, Addis Ababa University, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
⁸ Department of Ophthalmology, Cambridge University Hospitals, Cambridge, UK.
⁹ Universidade Federal de Sao Paulo, Sao Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil.
¹⁰ Department of Ophthalmology, San Raffaele Scientific Institute, Milano, Italy.
¹¹ IRCCS San Raffaele Scientific Institute, Vita-Salute University, via Olgettina 60, 20123, Milan, Italy.
¹² Ophthalmology Department, CHU de Poitiers, Poitiers, France.
¹³ Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA.
¹⁴ University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW, Australia.
¹⁵ Brien Holden Vision Institute, Sydney, NSW, Australia.
¹⁶ Melbourne School of Population and Global Health, University of Melbourne, Melbourne, VIC, Australia.
¹⁷ Vision and Eye Research Unit, Postgraduate Medical Institute, Anglia Ruskin University, Cambridge, UK.
¹⁸ Department of Computer Science, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK.

^# Contributed equally.

PMID: 38461217
DOI: 10.1038/s41433-024-02961-1

Abstract

Background: To estimate global and regional trends from 2000 to 2020 of the number of persons visually impaired by cataract and their proportion of the total number of vision-impaired individuals.

Methods: A systematic review and meta-analysis of published population studies and gray literature from 2000 to 2020 was carried out to estimate global and regional trends. We developed prevalence estimates based on modeled distance visual impairment and blindness due to cataract, producing location-, year-, age-, and sex-specific estimates of moderate to severe vision impairment (MSVI presenting visual acuity <6/18, ≥3/60) and blindness (presenting visual acuity <3/60). Estimates are age-standardized using the GBD standard population.

Results: In 2020, among overall (all ages) 43.3 million blind and 295 million with MSVI, 17.0 million (39.6%) people were blind and 83.5 million (28.3%) had MSVI due to cataract blind 60% female, MSVI 59% female. From 1990 to 2020, the count of persons blind (MSVI) due to cataract increased by 29.7%(93.1%) whereas the age-standardized global prevalence of cataract-related blindness improved by -27.5% and MSVI increased by 7.2%. The contribution of cataract to the age-standardized prevalence of blindness exceeded the global figure only in South Asia (62.9%) and Southeast Asia and Oceania (47.9%).

Conclusions: The number of people blind and with MSVI due to cataract has risen over the past 30 years, despite a decrease in the age-standardized prevalence of cataract. This indicates that cataract treatment programs have been beneficial, but population growth and aging have outpaced their impact. Growing numbers of cataract blind indicate that more, better-directed, resources are needed to increase global capacity for cataract surgery.