It is "myopidemia" among children under 14. The increase in the number of short-sighted young people, more than doubled compared to ten years ago, was revealed by Paolo Nucci, Professor of Ophthalmology at the State University of Milan on the occasion of the National Congress of the Italian Society of Ophthalmic Sciences (Siso). "Today it is estimated that approximately 35% of children under the age of 14 are short-sighted, practically one in three. It is not a proportion that we can define as normal: it is so because in the last ten years the number of short-sighted children and adolescents has doubled, with a sudden acceleration in the last two years.
The causes? It is paradoxical, but myopia seems to be a sort of side effect of education". To combat the problem, experts suggest epidemiological surveillance, beyond five diopters, in fact, "it is associated with pathological consequences on the retina, a greater incidence of glaucoma and cataracts", but also more time outdoors, where the sun stimulates the production of dopamine. "Being in the open air, the eyes strain less because they have to look far away - he continues - they are not forced into hyper-accommodation continues as it happens in front of a display. But there's more: it also seems that the sun's rays stimulate the production of dopamine, a substance capable of inhibiting metalloproteases, an enzyme which, by making the sclera more elastic, favors the lengthening of the eyeball and therefore myopia".
In terms of prevention, however, a strategy is needed: mandatory screening visits starting from the age of three and a wider use of optical and pharmacological therapies capable of slowing down its evolution. "In fact, when prevention and appropriate behaviors to avoid the onset of myopia or its worsening are not enough - concludes Scipione Rossi, Siso Secretary and director of the Complex Ophthalmology Unit of the S. Carlo di Nancy Hospital in Rome - we can resort to special spectacle lenses that are used to block the progression of myopia: in association with very diluted atropine-based eye drops they can block the progression and, in some cases, even block it if nothing is done, if the defect does not appear discovered and treated, it will become adult myopia, with all the social costs that entails."