The story behind soaring myopia among kids
October 17, 20233:00 AM ET
By Manoush Zomorodi, Katie Monteleone, Sanaz Meshkinpour, Rachel Faulkner White
The World Health Organization warns that by 2030, 40% of the world’s population will be nearsighted. In the U.S. alone, myopia rates have soared over the past 50 years, from 25% in 1971 to nearly 42% in 2017. Many of these myopia cases are in children—who are going nearsighted at increasingly younger ages. In China, where they specifically track early onset myopia, over 80% of teens and young adults are now nearsighted.
There’s been a longstanding debate over why so many kids are going nearsighted—because bad eyesight used to be attributed solely to genetics. Now, experts agree that something else is going on, resulting from a shift in how children spend the majority of their time. Too little time outside. Too much time indoors, often staring at screens.
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For a young child whose eyes are still developing, these habits cause their eyes to prioritize near vision rather than distance vision. In turn, their eyeballs begin to elongate, triggering nearsightedness.
“We’re talking about [children who are] age four or five years old becoming myopic,” said Dr. Maria Liu, an associate professor of clinical optometry at The University of California, Berkeley.
Kids are developing myopia earlier and earlier
Harmony Yu was seven years old when her distance vision became blurry. She had been reading a lot—roughly 200 pages a day—and all that time spent looking at text close up on the page had caused her to develop myopia.
Yu’s mother, Qing Cai, took her daughter’s diagnosis very seriously. “When she was diagnosed with myopia, my husband and I both went through a sleepless night because she was so [young] and we knew how bad it can get,” Cai told NPR.
Early onset myopia can lead to dangerous vision problems later in life, including retinal detachment, glaucoma, cataracts, and even complete loss of vision.
But Harmony’s case is not unique. She’s one of 1700 patients seeking treatment at Dr. Maria Liu’s Myopia Control Clinic – the first of its kind in the U.S. – at the University of California, Berkeley.
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A quest to slow down the progression of myopia in children
Dr. Liu opened the clinic in 2013, despite skepticism from many of her colleagues.
“The clinical side of the school considered myopia a pure genetic problem,” said Liu. “They didn’t even believe myopia control was a thing.”
But Dr. Liu had come across a treatment some time ago in China, during her ophthalmology residency. It was a special type of contact lenses called orthokeratology, or ortho-k, shown to slow down the progression of myopia in children. These are hard contact lenses that are worn overnight—kind of like wearing a retainer for teeth—that can reshape the patient’s eyeballs back to a healthy spherical shape while potentially correcting their vision.
This is not a new treatment, and it’s not right for everyone, but Dr. Liu began prescribing it to many of her patients at her clinic, including Harmony Yu.
“My vision went from pretty blurry, couldn’t see distant objects, to really sharp, and color was clearer, especially in farther areas,” said Yu. “I was really happy about that. I can actually see things without having to spend too much effort or having really thick glasses on my nose.”
Preventing myopia in children
Dr. Liu explained that the best way to protect children against early onset myopia is to limit screen time and get them playing outside as much as possible. “They need to play with real toys,” Liu said. “They need to engage in real outdoor life.”
This advice goes for adults, too. Dr. Liu suggests taking regular outdoor breaks to scan the horizon for 3-5 minutes in order to exercise our distance vision. She notes that these breaks are most effective after a sustained amount of near work, and that sunlight itself is highly protective against myopia as well. And one further caveat – looking out the window or looking around a large indoor space doesn’t count. Our eyes can sense the walls and ceiling when we are indoors, which crowds our peripheral vision, according to Liu. Thus, getting fully outdoors is key.
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So, next time you find yourself staring at a screen for hours, try your best to take a break and get some fresh air. Look into the far distance, try to spot some birds in the trees or planes in the sky. Your eyes will thank you in the long run.
This story was written by Katie Monteleone and edited by Amanda Orr. It is part of Body Electric — NPR’s 6-part series exploring the relationship between technology and the human body.
Follow along with the whole series here. Talk to us on Instagram @ManoushZ, and on Facebook @tedradiohour, or record a voice memo and email it to us at [email protected].
Body Electric was produced by Katie Monteleone and edited by Sanaz Meshkinpour with production support from Rachel Faulkner White.
Original music by David Herman. Our audio engineer was Valentina Rodríguez Sánchez. Our fact checker was Chloee Weiner.
