Prem Rawat Foundation renews support for Eye Hospital

The Prem Rawat Foundation supports the work of the St. John Eye Hospital Group

The St. John of Jerusalem Eye Hospital Group is pleased to announce a second award from the Prem Rawat Foundation in the United States. In 2008, the Hospital Group received $20,000 (US) to help support vital work in Gaza.  This year the amount donated has increased significantly to $25,000, and will help support the Group’s children’s services throughout the occupied Palestinian territory (OPT).

Though 80% of blindness is preventable, the people of the OPT suffer a rate of blindness ten times higher than the West.  Eye care in the region is vital as blindness and poverty go hand in hand.  World Health Organisation estimates the cost to the OPT of blindness and impaired vision by 2020 at a potential $33.7m. 

Working with children is especially important as, throughout the Middle East, consanguinity – children born to related parents, usually first cousins – is common. Offspring born of such marriages run an increased risk of congenital abnormality.  Mobility restrictions in the OPT encourage this practice and probably half of all children are affected. Unfortunately, the eye is particularly susceptible to congenital disease and many children are born with severely impaired vision as a result.

In the OPT, obvious defects of the eye are socially stigmatized and can lead to children being hidden at home and not sent to school, thereby decreasing their chances of playing a productive role in adulthood. Women with such defects are less likely to marry.

The Prem Rawat Foundation is a North American grant-giving organisation with a dual purpose of bringing Prem Rawat's message of peace as well as providing essential humanitarian aid to those who need it most.

If you'd like more information about the Prem Rawat Foundation award, please follow this link.