Technology Home reading
technology to allow people to read, write and recognize faces.
Advances in technology, genetics, brain science and biology are making a goal that long seemed
out of reach -- restoring sight -- more feasible.
"For a long time, scientists and clinicians were very conservative, but you have to at some point
get out of the laboratory and focus on getting clinical trials in actual humans," said Timothy J.
Schoen, director of science and preclinical development for the Foundation Fighting Blindness.
Now "there's a real push," he said, because "we've got a lot of blind people walking around, and
we've got to try to help them."
More than 3.3 million Americans 40 and over, or about one in 28, are blind or have vision so
poor that even with glasses, medicine or surgery, everyday tasks are difficult, according to the
National Eye Institute, a federal agency. That number is expected to double in the next 30 years.
annaabi.ee 
