The blind and deaf

Essay by EssaySwap ContributorHigh School, 12th grade February 2008

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Blindness and deafness is a problem that plagues millions of people everywhere. Both of these disabilities can be lived and coped with. For some degree of these dysfunctions there is a way to reverse the blindness or deafness, but in most cases the effects are permanent Blindness is the total or partial inability to see. Deafness is the inability to hear and understand speech. Both of these defects are tragic, but can be dealt with and the effected individuals can live a basically normal life.

Blindness can be described in two different ways. People who are totally blind cannot tell light from dark and people who are partially blind may have some sight that can be useful to them for different purposes. Some people are born congenitally blind and others have acquired blindness. Acquired blindness can come from disease or injury. There are other conditions of blindness. Some people have what is called night blindness.

They cannot see well when there is limited light. Another blindness is color blindness. In this individuals cannot distinguish one color from another.

Congenital blindness means that someone is born blind. Everyone else who is blind gets it from disease or injury. Disease causes about 95% of all blindness. There are a high number of diseases that can cause blindness. Some of these are as follows: Cataracts, Diabetic, Glaucoma, Macular degeneration, Amblyopia, Corneal opacity, and Trachomia just to name a few of the many that exist. many kinds of injuries can cause blindness. Infection from germs, chemicals that can burn eyes, damage to the head, and a wound in the optic nerves. In many jobs, workers are required to wear protective eyeglasses to prevent vision loss.

Overcoming blindness is not an impossible task. There are schools that teach special techniques to people who are blind...