WHO admits World Council of Optometry into “official relations”

ORLANDO – Here during the closing session of the first World Congress on Optometric Globalization on Wednesday, Serge Resnikoff, MD, PhD, director of Prevention of Blindness and Deafness programs, World Health Organization, Geneva, announced that in recognition of the World Council of Optometry’s role in global public health, the WHO has officially admitted the WCO into relations with the organization. The announcement led to a standing ovation from all of the approximately 150 attendees from around the world. The WCO joins 188 other organizations that have official relationships with the WHO.

At a press conference Thursday at the American Optometric Association Congress, also here in Orlando, Dr. Resnikoff said that the collaboration between WCO and WHO will address three areas: human resource development, “making people more aware of the problems,” he said; strategic partnerships with other organizations involved in the prevention of blindness; and data collection. “Without broad partnerships, it’s just not feasible [to address blindness prevention],” Dr. Resnikoff said. “We look forward to the WCO playing a major role, because WCO has its own kind of network. WCO brings a new kind of group to this global initiative.”

WCO President Damien P. Smith, AM, MScOptom, PhD, FAAO, also said at the press conference, “What the World Health Organization has done for us is complete the positioning of optometry in the mainstream of international public health. It means that optometry is now represented on every international public health care forum in eye care that it could possibly be represented in.”