Dr. Maria Meehan:

I thank members of the committee. Research obviously goes hand-in-hand with the National Vision Coalition and Fighting Blindness has supported outstanding research, as part of the coalition, for the past 31 years. Irish scientists are at the forefront of vision research in the world. One point of which the National Vision Coalition is greatly in favour is the use of registries because, at present, Ireland does not have a national registry of eye disease. Therefore, we need the framework in place and consequently must work together to build our registries together to make clinical trials and better treatments happen for Irish people. While a lot of these might take place in other countries, some will take place here and we need something that can work internationally to allow best outcomes for our patients.

Another point I wish to make in respect of research is that with our strategy, we also need to educate. Deputy Mitchell O'Connor touched on the point of somebody who is visually impaired being invisible and this comes from educating our secondary schoolchildren and we are also very much in favour of integrating that.