LIONS IN ACTION
Keeping Kids Moving with Safe Bikes
SightFirst is Lions' most ambitious and most successful initiative ever. Thanks to SightFirst, Lions have restored sight to 7.6 million people through cataract surgeries, prevented serious vision loss for 30 million people and improved eye care services for hundreds of millions.
SightFirst was launched by Lions in 1989 to battle preventable blindness. Sadly, 80 percent of the world's blind were needlessly without sight. Through SightFirst, Lions have prevented blindness by supporting cataract surgeries, helping expand eye hospitals and clinics, educating the public, distributing sight-saving medication, training eye care professionals and establishing sustainable eye care systems in underserved areas.
SightFirst has not only been stunningly effective but also startlingly efficient. On average, about every US$6 in donations has resulted in a person with vision restored or saved from blindness. In the 1990s, Campaign SightFirst raised US$143 million. With the successful conclusion the three-year Campaign SightFirst II in July 2008, Lions will expand current SightFirst programs and launch new initiatives through the more than US$200 million raised.
72
The number of thriving premature children who attended a 2008 birthday party sponsored by Lions in Elkhart, Indiana, who funded equipment for the neonatal unit at the local hospital.