The RNIB or The Royal National Institute of the Blind has released a statement saying that obese men and women have a two times greater chance of going blind as they say that obesity increases the risk of certain eye conditions. Obesity is known to increase the chances of you getting cataracts as well as old age related macular degeneration that is the most commonly known reason for blindness.

The RNIB stressed that people need to look after their eyes better and that losing weight was one way of doing that. With the big increases in obesity in the UK it was clear that more and more people would start to lose their sight or have vision problem.

There are 4 main obesity related vision loss conditions with the most obvious one being age related macular degeneration or AMD which is the biggest reason for blindness in the UK affecting about half a million people. Anyone with a BMI of 30+ has double the chance of getting what is known as dry AMD and obesity has also been seen to boost progress of wet AMD that may cause sight loss very fast over a matter of a few months.

Cataracts are also much more prevalent in obese people with a double risk for them and obesity significantly adds to the the chances of getting Type 2 diabetes that can in itself cause diabetic retinopathy. Blindness partial or otherwise from diabetes is often seen in people from Asia, Africa and the Caribbean who have a much greater chance of getting diabetes. A link between obese and glaucoma has been seen by researchers too and this is due to pressure within the eyes.

With this big increase of obesity it is essential that people are clearly made aware that they could be putting their eyes under strain too. The publicising of the sight risk may in fact work as an incentive for people to lose body fat and to go on a diet. In questioning people often say that sight is the sense that they would hate to lose more that any other and it is probably the sense that we consider to be the most useful.