Half a billion people need reading glasses. Why can't they get them?

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  NPR.

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  It's one of those annoying facts of life that the older you get, the more often you find that your body just doesn't work like it used to.

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  Case in point, I'm almost 40 years old, and for the past year or so, I find that just reading things has become more difficult.

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  Like, I find myself squinting to read an article on my computer or just like constantly enlarging the font.

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  And I know that this is only going to get worse in the coming years.

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  And the fact of this would be personally and professionally devastating if the solution were not extremely easy and cheap to come by.

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  Reading glasses, right?

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  I can get reading glasses at any pharmacy or convenience store for just a few bucks online, I could get five pairs of reading glasses for a little more than a dollar apiece.

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  And that's why I was super surprised to learn this statistic.

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  According to a report by the Lancet Global Health Commission, the number of people who have unaddressed vision loss that could be solved with a simple pair of reading glasses is around 510 million.

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  That is more than the populations of the US, Mexico, and Canada combined.

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  So if reading glasses are so available and cheap here in the US, why are so many people around the world living without them?

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  This is the indicator for Planet money.

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  I'm Adrian Ma, and today on the show we'll answer that question and we'll learn the economic solution to this reading glasses shortage.

• 01:47

  Support comes from our 2024 lead sponsor of the indicator from Planet Money, Amazon Business everyone could use more time Amazon Business offers smart business buying solutions so you can spend more time growing your business and less time doing the admin.

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