Charenton-le-Pont, France (March 21, 2024) – On the occasion of World Optometry Week 2024, EssilorLuxottica and the World Council of Optometry (WCO) announced a global partnership to raise the awareness and understanding of presbyopia and the aging eye, with the aim to establish standards of care for eye care professionals to follow when managing the condition. This initiative will also help eye care professionals with the latest evidence-based scientific approaches, tools and resources focused on the three pillars of mitigation, measurement, and management of presbyopia.

Presbyopia is a naturally occurring condition that people typically begin to develop when they reach 40-45 years of age. Currently, there are an estimated 2.1 billion people worldwide with presbyopia¹. As the world's population is aging, it is estimated that by 2050, more than 4 billion people in the world will have presbyopia (approximately 40% of the world's population)². With the extension of life expectancy, the majority of individuals will experience an intervention for the vision changes due to presbyopia for about half of their lifespan. Consequently, the different vision care solutions allow them to engage more in visually demanding near activities at older ages compared to previous generations. The demand on our eyes has significantly increased over the past three decades, notably due to the widespread use of digital devices. These changes highlight the importance of effectively evaluating, measuring and managing presbyopia among patients, particularly as it will likely have an impact on their daily activities and quality of life.

Aside from raising global awareness, the program will also feature insights from several international experts in the field, to build the standard of care resolution and bring the latest research and evidence in easily accessible educational materials available to all individuals interested in learning more about presbyopia. To ensure accessibility, assets will be published on both the WCO microsite and EssilorLuxottica's learning platform, Leonardo. Further updates on the available content and resources will be announced in the coming months.

WCO President Dr. Sandra Block said, "We are excited to partner with EssilorLuxottica to bring the importance of addressing our patients' needs to see well up close. There are many new options to address presbyopia, and we agree that it is important to bring the information to the eye care practitioner so they can provide the best care for the patients. Along with helping to ensure evidence-based techniques are used, the partnership will highlight the eye health changes that are on-going as the patients grow older".

"We are thrilled to partner with the World Council of Optometry, an organization that shares our vision to contribute to better eye health and vision care for people everywhere. Through this important program, I am certain that we will raise the global conversation around presbyopia and together make an even greater impact by providing a standard of care to manage the condition, but also providing the resources and support needed to help eye care professionals improve patient outcomes", said Olga Prenat, Head of Medical and Professional Affairs at EssilorLuxottica.

As part of its long-standing efforts to advance knowledge and education on vision care globally, EssilorLuxottica has been partnering with WCO since 2015 at their first World Congress of Optometry, and from then on, actively participating in all their congresses, and supporting other WCO global awareness initiatives such as the Global State of Optometry Survey. The survey will include information on scope of practice, competency levels, demographics, optometric education requirements, and regulatory information.

1. Eliminating poor vision in a generation Essilor SAS 2019 Market Scope, Global Presbyopia-Correcting Surgery Market Report, April 2012

2. Global population of 7.6 billion people in 2020 and 10 billion people in 2050 Source: United Nations, internal analysis

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