Donate old eyeglasses and give the gift of sight

Maybe you’ve got your eye on a cool new pair of frames, you had eye surgery or your child's prescription changed yet again. Chances are, you’ve got a perfectly good pair of old
glasses you can donate. 

A young woman had LASIK surgery after 12 years of wearing eyeglasses. Her vision was now clear and so was this: she did not want her old frames to end up in a landfill. There they were, her most recent pair, $100 eyeglasses with dark-colored plastic frames, in a box with another old pair. There were in like-new condition. Instead of throwing them away, she donated them. 

Donate old eyeglasses and change lives. Over 1 billion people around the world with vision loss and lack of access to eye care could regain their sight with a pair of eyeglasses, according to Lions Clubs International. Donated eyeglasses could help a child on the other side of the world to see the board at school or let a neighbor across town get the readers they need to get back to their favorite hobby.

In addition to giving the gift of sight, donating old glasses allows us to declutter our homes and divert a perfectly useful item from the dump. Since the average U.S. resident tosses 4.5 pounds of solid waste per day, anything we hold back can help.

Once eyeglasses are donated, they are assessed, the exact prescription determined, and
cleaned and possibly fixed if necessary. These old eyeglasses will then get matched to someone who needs them, around the world or in our neighborhood. Many donated glasses get used in “medical missions,” trips in which qualified medical professionals provide free vision care and correction in areas with limited access to eye doctors and health resources.

Lions Clubs International Marlin Lions Club continues to operate a network of collection boxes to collect eyeglasses and volunteers are continuing to process donated glasses for
distribution through medical missions around the world.

Wondering where to donate eyeglasses? Marlin Lions Club has placed a donation box at each of the following places in Marlin: Main Street Fitness, BancorpSouth Bank, Junk Store, Nail Experts, The Chicken Place, Millers’, Falls County Tax Assessors office, Falls County Samaritan House, and Falls County Hospital and Clinic.

Eyeglasses in good to excellent condition, fit for a friend or relative, are appreciated. Won’t you donate your old glasses? It's easy to do, and someone else can make good use
of them.