School closures are among the most controversial options for controlling the COVID-19 pandemic, with authorities debating whether the protective measure is worth the potential educational, social and emotional costs.
Researchers in China have discovered another health concern faced by children who are kept alone for long periods of time; visual acuity declining.
Visually impaired vision – medically known as myopia – is already a worrying problem in East Asian countries, prompting China to make it a health priority in recent years.
One of his public programs is an annual eye examination for school children. Based on a diagnostic process called photoscreening, the system captures light-induced reflexes in each eye, giving technologists a picture of refraction errors or abnormalities in vital eye anatomy.
Researchers used photoscreening records from children in 10 Shandong primary schools, all collected at the beginning of each school year since 2015.
With COVID forcing schools to close for the first half of 2020, a new school year began in June rather than the normal September. The routine screening nonetheless, giving ophthalmologists and researchers a good view of the eyes of thousands of children between the ages of six and 13.
In total, the five-year follow-up test gave scientists a total of 389,808 eyes.
A study of the frequency of reflex errors detected in these eyes revealed a relatively steady trend from 2015 to 2019, with perhaps a slight shift toward myopia.
That trend was unprecedented in the 2020 results, however, with a sharp jump in errors deserving of faint vision, especially among six- to eight-year-olds.
In fact, the frequency of myopia in children aged six was three times greater than in any previous year.
While we can only think of the reason for the wide-ranging change, by looking hard at books and screens for long periods while we are indoors we will do the trick just nicely.
“This major myopic trend was not seen in any other year-on-year comparison, making the reason probably due to the unusual occurrence of home restriction in 2020,” the researchers found. recommended in their report.
The results may have been due to the fact that the screening took place in June rather than September, along with all masking and distance warnings associated with diffuse safety.
However, the differences were not consistent across all ages tested, so it is likely that difficult factors were to blame.
It’s just a mystery exactly why some ages have been influenced by others. As younger children tended to have fewer tasks to complete under home education, changes in screen time or differences in volume of near-visual work may not be enough to explain what’s going on.
Spending time outdoors is known to be helpful, but again, it is difficult to argue that there is any significant difference between the time that six- and 13-year-olds spend. outside.
What seems to be that six-year-olds are just going through a development that is more sensitive to environmental influences. With a longer window of loneliness, even older children may be challenged by their vision.
“If this is the case, the period of environmental change may be the main risk factor for the development of myopia, with younger children being more sensitive to environmental change than older children,” the team said. writing.
“Children between the ages of six and eight may have a critical time for the development of myopia.”
It is a hypothesis that needs further research to determine one way or another.
In any case, the results strongly indicate that spending a lot of time indoors during our childhood increases the risk to our vision.
This is not to say that we need schools to be open because of the eyes of our children. With the pandemic far from over, it is important that we do all we can to save lives by isolating where necessary.
But knowing how loneliness affects our children’s development means we can take steps to reduce its impact.
By limiting screen time, keeping digital media half a meter away (at least 18 inches or so) from the front and spending time outdoors each day where possible could be. enough to at least mitigate some of the effects of indoor loneliness on the scene.
COVID-19 has put enough emphasis on human health. Our sight does not have to be another expense.
This research was published in Ophthalmology JAMA.