Quite a few things bug me about this piece.<p>>I’m on my annual win-a-trip journey, in which I take a university student with me on a trip to the developing world to cover underreported issues.<p>Firstly, I don't think this is 'under reported', I've seen at least two full length documentaries about this procedure in Nepal, the project has its own Facebook page [0] and a Google search for 'Nepal cataract' turns up lots of trad media results.<p>Secondly, if the author has taken a student to cover things, why aren't e reading the student's piece ?<p>Lastly, the author - like most people who haven't undergone this type of surgery - falls into the trap of breathlessly hailing this as a miraculous cure for blindness. It's not. While the restored sight is absolutely better than having cataracts and will indeed cheer you up in the immediate term, the vision provided by the replacement lenses is a far cry from a person's natural vision, for one thing these lenses have a fixed focus. Another issue is the limited life span - eventually they fur up, but don't go hard like UV induced cataracts - which necessitates replacement or laser surgery.<p>Humans - particularly the kind that live up mountains in Nepal - are adaptable and can cope, but as someone who has had this surgery (and the follow up laser surgery) it annoys me that reportage routinely fails to mention these kinds of things.<p>In this particular case, it is also quite peculiar that the author fails to point out that handing out a $5 pair of sunglasses would prevent the cataracts in the first place (these are pretty much all UV induced). Education and prevention in this respect <i>are</i> very much under reported.<p>[0] <a href="https://www.facebook.com/cureblindness/" rel="nofollow">https://www.facebook.com/cureblindness/</a>