Millions of people around the world suffer from vision loss, and the number of these people is estimated at between 50 and 75 million, while there is a person who loses his sight every 5 seconds, which means that more than 6.3 million people lose their sight annually, not to mention that there are about 300 million people who have severe vision impairment.
Because sight is the dominant sense of all senses, without it, an individual struggles to learn, walk, read, and participate in many activities with others. Therefore, poor vision constitutes a huge global burden with an annual production cost equivalent to $411 billion.
As a result, many people and institutions have tried to compensate the blind for their lost special abilities by exploiting other senses, such as Braille, which uses the sense of touch to read through raised dots, while technology has developed many methods and tools to compensate for the sense of sight.
Technology has played on two axes to help the blind, the first of which was through what is called assistive technology through elements designed specifically for the blind, such as digital readers that contain the ability to convert text into audible sound, or the Braille Sense device, which is similar to a computer and supports many different functions such as word processing, the Internet and recording, or smart readers, some of which come in the size of mobile phones; to help read texts by scanning letters, or printers that have the ability to print in Braille, which gives the blind the ability to write.
The other axis of technology was indirect, and this happened through the integration of devices and artificial intelligence, which in turn led to improved texts and provided better experiences for individuals. Also, touch devices and wearable devices helped in instant access to information, and more effective interaction.
For its part, the Kingdom has made many efforts to support the visually impaired, enabling them to mix with all segments of society without feeling any disability or difficulty, as it has enabled them to receive education by allocating a budget to print educational books in Braille, and providing a number of the aforementioned machines and tools and distributing them free of charge to the visually impaired, in addition to opening many institutes and programs for all levels with the aim of providing the best educational and pedagogical services to the visually impaired.