Posted on 01/06/2025 10:10:02 AM PST by jerod
With 'near time' identified as a problem, parents urged to boosting outdoor time
New research shows the rate of myopia among children and teens worldwide has tripled over the past three decades, with a particularly steep increase noted since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.
A paper in the British Journal of Ophthalmology, which reviewed 276 studies published to June 2023 from around the world, concluded that more than one in three of all children and teens are nearsighted, triple what it was in 1990.
"Emerging evidence suggests a potential association between the pandemic and accelerated vision deterioration among young adults," states the report, published in September.
The authors forecast that if the current trends continue, about 740 million children and teens — more than half globally — will be myopic by 2050.
The paper estimates the current rate of myopia among children in Canada at roughly 25 per cent. That number is lower than the international average but it's still a significant increase from the prevalence of 17.5 per cent, concluded by University of Waterloo researchers in a paper published in early 2018.
"Myopia has increased dramatically during the period of COVID," said Lisa Christian, associate director of clinical practice at the University of Waterloo School of Optometry.
Christian said the research suggests the trends are linked to kids spending more time indoors doing what's known as "near work," such as looking at books, computers or phone screens. The strain this puts on the eye muscles can cause myopia.
"When we're indoors, we're focused on near work most of the time, we're looking at one spot," Christian told CBC News in an interview. "When we're outside, we're looking far away, so we're relaxing our eyes."
Successive studies have shown how myopia is related to too little time outdoors in childhood.
The 2018 University of Waterloo study, which focused on children aged six to 13, found that one additional hour of outdoor time per week could lower the child's odds of developing myopia by 14 per cent. "Time spent outdoors was the only child activity to have a significant impact on myopia," it stated....
Leftist chicks seem to have an affinity for ugly oversized granny glasses. This must be a recent trend.
No, I’m sure it has nothing to do with shots. No need to incoherently blame everything bad on them as some are predisposed to do. I was a bookworm from a very young age, and have spent most of my time in front of a screen otherwise. This is utterly not a surprise for me. I’d be legally blind without corrective vision (which is thankfully effective). I make a point now to spend time outside (hiking and so forth), but the damage is done.
Probably has much more to do with everyone having their faces planted on their cell phones.
In our extended family the kids who hunted a lot had longsightedness or perfect vision while the kids who sat in their rooms studying and reading ended up shortsighted.
Every minute a kid looks at a phone screen is a moment taken away from developing their imagination. And when they fail at a task with no alternative provided, they fail because they can’t concieve a novel solution due to lack of exercising their imagination.
I think excess retinol can cause myopia.
“I’ll quit when I need glasses.”
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