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Asked by razor jaw86 to Carolyn, Peter, Richard, Sara, Siana on 6 Nov 2015.
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Richard Unwin answered on 6 Nov 2015:
Great question.
There are several causes of blindness, and each will need its own cure. Cataracts (cloudy patches in the lens) can cause blindness but can be removed in an operation.
The most common cause of blindness is a disease called AMD (age-related macular degeneration) where the macula – the bit at the back of the eye that collects light – gets damaged. Our group are studying how that happens, and if we are right, we could try to reverse it. We’re also working on a new drug to stop the overgrowth of blood vessels in the back of the eye that is part of this disease.
Other work in Manchester has recently showed that if you raise the levels of a certain gene in the eyes of blind mice , they can recover some vision (which they test by showing the mice a video of an owl swooping down on them – the blind mice ignore it and the treated mice ran away!).
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Sara Falcone answered on 6 Nov 2015:
Well Richard gave you a perfect answer!
I can add that another way of curing blindness when the cause is a genetic disease is to inject the copy of a “healthy gene” that will replace the “sick gene”. It’s called gene therapy. It is not well established yet but it is very promising.
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Carolyn Nielsen answered on 9 Nov 2015:
Blindness can also be caused by infections, and the world’s leading cause of preventable blindness is a bacterium called trachoma. This infection causes inturned eyelashes, which over time will scar the eye and lead to blindness. This can be cured at early stages through antibiotics or surgery, but you need to catch it in time and so prevention is really important through good facial hygiene. Trachoma disappeared from Europe a long time ago but there are still millions of people in developing countries who are at risk of infection.
Scientists and the World Health Organisation are optimistic though and want to eliminate trachoma completely!
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