Of the 10 to 12 patients Dr Ashok Sharma, director, Cornea Centre, treats this time of the year, half suffer from severe injuries due to firework accidents during Diwali that result in blindness. “One child lost his eyelashes and eyebrows, then his vision deteriorated rapidly because cracker powder had damaged the surrounding tissue,” he says.

What worsened matters was when a family member applied ghee to his eye, hoping it would soothe his condition. Dr Sharma first administered antibiotic drops after cleaning foreign particles. The child had a limbal ischemia (insufficient blood flow to the limbus, which is the border between the cornea and sclera in the eye).

“We had to do a graft till his condition improved. After six weeks, the child’s eyelid began to stick to the eyeball. The patie

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