28 April 2006

Businessmen and Bankers Can't See

A friend sent me an SMS days ago asking for an ophthalmologic referral. I asked why, and she said that her right eye seems infected, and she felt she had a foreign body sensation whenever she blinks. She uses contact lenses. I thought of her today, and wondered if she also uses the contact lens solution that has been reported lately to be associated with increasing eye infections.

Recently, a well-known contact lens manufacturer has been put in the spot not because of the contact lenses it manufactures, but because of the fungal eye infections people are getting from using its contact lens cleaner solution. It has withdrawn the product weeks ago, but some news reports say that the eye infections continue to increase as the weeks go by.

A fresh report says that the company was alerted by the HK government as early as September 2005 about increasing eye infections among the users of its contact lens solution, but no immediate action was done to withdraw the product from the market.

I'm becoming more and more convinced that health matters shouldn't be put in the hands of businessmen, or bankers, if you read my previous post. They take too long to act.

Fungal keratitis is a serious eye infection you woundn't want to have. Read here for more details.

Let me end this with a quote from the LA Times editorial two days ago:
"ANYBODY WITH A SERIOUS ILLNESS would rather see a doctor than a banker."

4 reactions:

tintin said...

I use acuvue as my contacts and optima as my solution. Whew.

I had to chuckle at the link with more info about keratitis.

I scrolled to the symptoms:

" * he most common signs on slit lamp examination are nonspecific and include the following:

o Conjunctival injection

o Epithelial defect

o Suppuration

o Stromal infiltration

o Anterior chamber reaction

o Hypopyon"

I have to google pretty much each symptom to find out what they mean lol.

ipanema said...

Businessmen and Bankers Can't See.

>>Maybe they've used a lot of the eye solution, they've become blind..lol.

Am thinking hard about the topic, am trying to see where the bankers in the article comes in.

I have an eye disease that could recur. It's inoperable. I don't use contact lenses either. I have natural brown eyes.

I really can't write on the topic...lol. Engage me please.

ipanema said...

Sort of. Link was to World Bank accussations with ref. to malaria that's why am a bit confused why it was linked.

Thanks bayi. Got the picture now. My eyes isn't dilated anymore...lol. I think, anything that involves money is a big controversy. How much they intend to fund a certain programme and how much is really needed isn't enough. So, they resort to public funding, I mean donations. How the money channels from the World Bank to recipient countries to the people entails a lot of people in between. What happens then can sometimes be the cause of loss of funds, inadequate funds, thus affecting the intended programme.

In short, there are middle men from the WB--country--businessmen--coordinators--people. See this chain? Somewhere inside this link, something happens - corruption, red tape, etc. This is were they can't see each other clearly. Accusations fly during this stage.

I hope I'm making sense...lol. Forgive me, my mind isn't functioning well, was awake from 2 a.m. up to now.

Baiklah, mari kita ke kedai kopi. :)

nikki said...

I used Renu before. Fortunately, I didn't experience any infection but I don't use my contact lenses that often.

I think they haven't been marketing Renu here in the Philippines for sometime now because when I bought new contact lenses last year, I was informed that Renu was no longer available in the market.