Towards addressing the critical shortage of corneas and to combat blindness in Nigeria, experts have highlighted a pressing need for more Nigerians to embrace corneal donation.

The experts who gathered at a symposium organised by the Eye Bank for the Restoring of Sight in Nigeria, in commemoration of 2024, regretted the prevalence of corneal blindness but noted that vision could be restored through corneal graft surgery with healthy donated corneas.

To dispel misconceptions about cornea donation being linked to reincarnation, the experts identified the crucial need to encourage more Nigerians to become willing donors.

In his advocacy talk entitled “Giving a gift that goes on living” for promotion of visual restoration for the blind with corneal graft, the past Chairman, Board of Governors of the Eye Bank for the Restoring of Sight in Nigeria, Dr Bade Ogundipe, said a single cornea donation has the potential to restore sight to four blind individuals.

“If you pledge your cornea while you are alive, it can give up to four people who are blind their vision back after you are dead. One cornea can be used to treat three or four people, if we have a good eye bank, we can separate that cornea into tissues that could be used for different individuals, depending on their problems. So, it’s essential for us that we have a good eye bank.

“The cornea normally does not have blood, and that is one of the properties that makes it so very clear so that we can see through it. Unfortunately, when the cornea sustains significant damage, it turns white.”

Ogundipe said the world is currently dependent on cornea donation, there are no artificial corneas available, so we have to donate corneas, and that is what we use for transplant.

“We only have a few people donating corneas in Nigeria. I don’t think we have harvested up to 10 corneas since the inception of the Eye Bank, and that means that there is a need for us to have our own source of corneas.

“Of all the cornea transplants that we have done in this country, and I’m sure we have done over 200, all of them, except a few of those corneas, were imported,” he noted.

“With some of the conditions that we’re talking about that lead to corneal blindness, about 70 percent of cases are preventable, but we still need to get around to educate our people on prevention.”

Further, he stated that most of the cornea problems in Nigeria are due to infection.

“Let everybody in the hospital be aware of what eye donation is all about. Let the hospitals be flooded with information regarding this, that will make us half prepared.

“We have to sensitise the people coming into the hospital, and we also need our private practitioners to get aware; we need to reach our colleagues in private practice, in General Hospitals anywhere, so that they can be armed with information about eye donation and cornea donation.”

Addressing concerns about the ethics of organ donation, a Professor of Medicine and Nephrologist, Prof. Jacob Awobusuyi, emphasised the potential impact on lives.

Awobusuyi, who is President of the Transplant Association of Nigeria, said medical ethics reinforce the importance of organ donation as a morally upright act, emphasising the duty to care for others.

“From a legal standpoint, the National Organ Transplant Act of 2014 provides the legal framework for organ donation and transplantation in the country.

“Philosophically, organ donation is rooted in the principle of beneficence, doing good for others. It aligns with the core values of humanity and compassion,” he argued.

Awobusuyi said the major religions in Nigeria endorse organ donation as a noble act, even as he emphasized the country’s supportive legal framework for ethical organ donation, safeguarding against illicit practices.

On his part, the Chairman, Board of Governors of the Eye Bank for Restoring Sight in Nigeria, Dr. Festus Odunayo Oshoba, said the sole aim is to encourage Nigerians all over the world to  donate part of themselves that can be useful for others, and they can keep on living forever.