Maryland Society for Sight

EYE SAFETY PROGRAM

The Maryland Society for Sight works to promote eye health and safety, particularly in the area of children's sports. One of the Society’s goals is to eliminate all sports related eye injuries in children.

The Society was instrumental in helping to get a law passed by the Baltimore City Council in December 2001. The law requires children 16 years of age and under playing baseball on city fields to wear a batting helmet with a protective face shield. Baltimore is the first city in the nation to pass such a law.

Every year, more than one million people throughout the U.S. suffer an eye injury that puts their vision at risk, and eye injuries are one of the leading causes of unilateral blindness in children. Over 40,000 of these injuries occur during sporting events and ninety percent are preventable if proper precautions are taken.

The Consumer Product Safety Commission stated that safety equipment for baseball could significantly reduce the number and severity of baseball related eye injuries to children each year.

Stuart R. Dankner, M.D., a pediatric ophthalmologist and Maryland Society for Sight Board member, states, "In many cases, these are irreversible, high-impact injuries. We want to eliminate this preventable cause of blindness in children.”

The Society is now working to get an eye safety law passed at the state level as well as meeting with sports organizations urging them to have their members wear protective equipment.

For more information on eye safety, please call 410-243-2020 or 1-800-MSS-EYES, or email us at info@mdsocietyforsight.org.

Then Mayor Martin O'Malley Signs Eye

Safety Law on February 4, 2002.

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