Reflections on an unequal world

Professor Frank Billson speaking in the Great Hall

By Fiona Curruthers

It is hard to believe, says Frank Billson, that the West can find $150 billion to fight wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, but cannot raise $1 billion to address health problems in the Third World.

The director of the University’s Save Sight Institute, who has spent 25 years helping people in Bangladesh overcome eye diseases, confronted the issue of Western priorities and responsibilities in a University lecture in the Great Hall.

Right: Professor Frank Billson speaking in the Great Hall.

He argued that the developed world has a moral duty to help the Third World overcome diseases that have largely been eradicated in the West. Success can even be achieved without great cost, he added, by the simple transfer of skills and knowledge.

“At a time of increased conflict and a global view of fighting terrorism, Australia should be at the forefront of providing less affluent nations, particularly in the Asian region, with the skills and resources they need to address disadvantages in health care,” he said.

Professor Billson, who has a particular interest in the prevention of blindness in children, pointed out that most cases of blindness in Australian children had developmental origins. By contrast, many cases of childhood blindness in developing countries were attributable to environmental factors such as infection and malnutrition, while others grew up with blindness as a result of treatable conditions such as glaucoma or congenital cataracts.

Professor Billson and Mrs Santow after the lecture
Professor Billson and Mrs Santow after the lecture

Such cases, he said, amounted to needless blindness with a high economic cost. Professor Billson has spent much of his career helping to train doctors in eye health, as well as developing skills transfer programs for other Australians overseas.

Right: Professor Billson and Mrs Santow after the lecture.

Professor Billson outlined a skill transfer project he undertook in 1978 to train doctors in basic ophthalmology in Chittagong, Bangaladesh. Although the Australian Government withdrew funding in 1988, because it felt the project would never become self-sustaining, 19 years after it began, the clinic finally achieved this goal. “Today, 110,000 people attend the eye clinic in Chittagong each year,” he said.

“This year the hospital celebrated the one millionth cataract operation performed as a result of the program which trains ophthalmologists for eight base hospitals throughout the country.”

In a wide-ranging talk, Professor Billson also paid tribute to his colleagues and predecessors who made landmark discoveries that improved the health of babies and children, including Sir Norman Gregg, who first identified the rubella cataract, and Dame Kate Campbell, who linked blindness in premature babies to the use of oxygen in resuscitation.

Professor Billson said that the Save Sight Institute, in association with Foresight Australia, was participating in the world initiative Vision 2020 to eliminate avoidable blindness by the year 2020. Foresight, he said, worked in partnership with Bangladeshi health services and had developed a program based on Under-5 clinics where vaccinations and Vitamin A supplements were given to young children while mothers were educated on simple ways to maintain a balanced nutritional diet.

Right: The Vice-Chancellor, Chancellor and Mrs Lee Santow greet the Governor (centre) and Sir Nicholas Shehadie

Vice-Chancellor, Chancellor and Mrs Lee Santow greet the Governor (centre) and Sir Nicholas Shehadie
Vice-Chancellor, Chancellor and Mrs Lee Santow greet the Governor (centre) and Sir Nicholas Shehadie

Professor Billson said blindness in children, measured in years of blindness, was the second commonest cause of blindness in the world today. “The technologies that we take for granted in developed countries, the microsurgery, all of which have emerged from the research associated with space shots and the development of new metals for fine needles, is available,” he said.

“We have the technology. What is needed is funds and commitment to the children who after all represent the future.

“It is sobering to reflect that a child goes blind every minute of the day.”

Closer to home, Professor Billson said he was tired of the pessimism surrounding the capacity of indigenous people to manage health programs. He argued that there were some models to be proud of, such as a screening program for diabetic retinopathy run by the University of Sydney with community organisations such as St. John Ambulance and the Northern Territory government in the town of Katherine.

He also paid tribute to the wealth of knowledge that Australians could learn from their indigenous fellow citizens. “There’s so much we can learn from Aboriginal Australians – for example, their respect and handling of a fragile environment that we are so clumsy about.”