Qatar Airways has announced that it has renewed its sponsorship as official airline partner of Orbis UK for a further three years.
Orbis is a global charity that brings people together to fight avoidable blindness through access to quality eye care. Together with its partners, Orbis trains eye teams, strengthens eye care services and works on the ground to provide lasting solutions to communities in need.
In a press statement yesterday, the airline said it has been a “proud supporter” of Orbis and its blindness prevention programmes since 2012.
Orbis’s Flying Eye Hospital spearheads the charity’s global efforts to transform lives. The world’s only accredited eye hospital with wings is equipped with a “state-of-the-art” operating theatre, which is connected to a classroom at the front of the room with a 3D screen, enabling those learning to get a real view of the surgery taking place. The aircraft also features pre- and post-op spaces for patients to recover.
Qatar Airways Group chief executive Akbar al-Baker said: “Qatar Airways strongly believes in giving back to the global community and making a difference. As an airline that connects communities and people around the world, we are delighted to continue our support for Orbis for another three years as official airline partner. This initiative is of great importance to the global communities served by this state-of-the-art flying medical facility, providing crucial eye care to people around the globe.”
Orbis UK trustee Dr Robert Walters said, “We are so thankful for Qatar Airways’ trust, friendship and support since 2012. Together, we have already hosted the Flying Eye Hospital in Doha three times and facilitated royal visits, enabling us to gather the support required to launch ‘Qatar Creating Vision’. It is only through the power of partnerships that we are able to proudly celebrate the millions of eye tests provided to children and the thousands of people trained to help find those struggling with low vision in communities.”
The renewed sponsorship this week also coincided with a visit by Sophie, Countess of Wessex, to a ‘Qatar Creating Vision’ programme in Dhaka and Chittagong, Bangladesh. There, she watched as patients’ bandages were removed, spoke with the Orbis volunteers transforming lives and the local medical teams undertaking brilliant work.
The royal visit concluded in Doha, where the Countess also met with al-Baker to celebrate the achievements of ‘Qatar Creating Vision’, which has undertaken 2.4mn eye tests for children and provided over 27,000 training sessions to doctors, teachers and community workers, to reach those living with unnecessary blindness, the statement noted.
In 2013, the Countess - in her role as ambassador for the International Agency for the Prevention of Blindness - visited Doha with the Orbis Flying Eye Hospital to discuss the devastating impact a lack of access to eye care can have on people across the world. In October 2015, the Qatar Fund for Development and Orbis launched ‘Qatar Creating Vision’, an initiative that brings together the people of Qatar in the fight against preventable blindness.
Earlier this year, the aircraft returned to Doha to bring together key stakeholders from across the ophthalmic medical community in Qatar to share knowledge of preferred practices and approaches to eye care.
 Qatar Charity (QC) said it has completed more than 50% of a campaign to combat blindness in Bangladesh, a campaign organised in co-operation with the British Orbis institution.
QC said in a statement that the campaign has so far covered the regions of Dhaka, Jalampur, Nagon and Barisal, resulted in the training of 79 doctors, 481 eye health workers, initial testing of about 1mn adults, initial screening of more than 200,000 children and treatment for more than 716,000 adults and 147,000 children.
A team of ophthalmologists has also been trained to perform cataracts and provide high quality medical devices to enable large numbers of surgeries to be performed, that is besides upgrading the management capabilities of specialised hospitals and to develop quality standards in 3 hospitals.
In March 2015, Qatar Charity and Orbis signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to pave the way for efforts to combat blindness and restore sight, focusing initially on Bangladesh with 7.4mn blind and visually impaired people.
Under the agreement, Qatar Charity will raise funds to fund blindness campaigns of more than QR4mn, while Orbis will carry out the project as a result of its long and continuous experience of more than 15 years in the face of blindness in Bangladesh.
The campaign aims to check up more than 2mn patients and restore sight to thousands by performing 50,000 eye surgeries in targeted cities and areas in Bangladesh, where 7.4mn people are blind and visually impaired.
Mohamed al-Ghamdi, Executive Director of International Development, Qatar Charity (QC), expressed QC’s desire to expand its partnership with Orbis, which has its longstanding experience in combating blindness.
He added that Qatar Charity is ready to harness all available resources in its field offices around the world and put all its expertise and experience accumulated at the international level in the service of the objectives of joint cooperation between the two parties.the eye patients of Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh, especially children.