The Impact of COVID-19 on Low Vision Communities

COVID-19 has fundamental impacts on billions of people globally, inevitably including  individuals with visual impairment. In ordinary times, many visually impaired individuals use assistive technologies in their daily activities to gain independence and autonomy. However, the complex nature of social interactions and social distancing in the era of COVID-19 have made independent life for visually impaired individuals more tenuous.  The analytics data from SuperVision – a vision assistance app – show a significant drop in app usage from early March 2020, just after WHO raised the global risk of COVID-19 spread form “high” to “very high”. The drop occurred over four weeks, until end of March (see red arrow in the figure), which appear to be similar to the timing of one third of the world population on lockdown.  Another recent drop, though not as drastic, coincides with the 2019 Christmas Holiday season (see green arrow in the figure). These trends might reflect reductions in job related activities or outdoor activities of visually impaired.