Costs of interventions for visual impairment.

Purpose: To quantify the economic costs of vision loss in Australia and assess the impact of a costed intervention package to prevent avoidable vision loss.

Design: Existing Australian population-based data on prevalence and causes of visual impairment were used, and costs were calculated from published data for the five main causes of visual impairment.

Methods: The cost of vision loss in Australia was determined from the weighted prevalence of visual impairment; unpublished data on the indirect costs of vision; and national databases on health care costs and other economic data.