Visual impairment in preschool children will increase 26 percent, affecting almost 220,000 children over the next 45 years, according to a study by the USC Gayle and Edward Roski Eye Institute published in JAMA Ophthalmology.
USC researchers found that between 2015 and 2060, multiracial American children will have the highest proportional increase (137 percent) in visual impairment cases, and Hispanic white children will remain the largest demographic group in terms of the absolute numbers of cases (44 percent of the total). Meanwhile, white American children will have the largest proportional decrease (21 percent). The states projected to have the most children with visual impairment over the next few decades are California, Texas and Florida.