Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.

Chinese declinism is one of the hot memes going around today. FP’s “5 Signs of the Chinese Economic Apocalypse” is typical of the genre, and you probably already know most of the high points: a big property bubble, social unrest, looming demographic apocalypse, competition from even lower-wage countries, etc. Today, though, brings a brand new entry: Chinese kids are studying so damn hard they’re going blind:

By the time they complete high school, as many as 90% of urban Chinese youth are afflicted by the condition known as myopia, in which close objects can be seen clearly but things just a few feet or inches away start to blur.

That’s about three times the rate among U.S. children. Even more troubling is the severity of the Chinese cases. Between 10% and 20% of nearsighted Chinese children are expected to develop “high myopia,” which is largely untreatable and may lead to blindness.

Some of this may be due to genetics, but Ian Morgan, a visiting professor at the Zhongshan Ophthalmic Center at Sun Yat-sen University, doesn’t think so:

Myopia has steadily increased in concert with China’s urbanization and intensified academic competition. It’s not uncommon for children in China to study four hours a day at home on top of a full day of school as well as attend several hours of tutoring on weekends.

“Parents want their kids to get into the best primary school so they can have a better chance at the best high school that can help them get into Beida, Tsinghua and Fudan,” Morgan said, referring to China’s three elite universities….Despite a 2007 order by Chinese authorities to boost physical education in schools to combat obesity and deteriorating eyesight, many educators — and parents — have resisted.

….”If your prescription at the end of the day is making Chinese care less about education, then it’s not going to happen,” said Nathan Congdon, a professor at the Zhongshan Ophthalmic Center. “That’s like telling Americans to like basketball or football less.”

The silver lining is that China is now one of the world’s fastest growing markets for glasses and contact lenses and laser surgery. So it’s not all bad.

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate