What a Little Vitamin A Could Do

By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
NYT

KOUNDARA, Guinea

I’m bouncing across West Africa in the back of a Land Cruiser with the winner of my “win-a-trip” contest, Paul Bowers, a student at the University of South Carolina, talking about wonky ways to tackle global poverty — such as vitamin A capsules.

Americans pretty much take vitamin A for granted, but many of the world’s poorest people lack it. And as a result, it is estimated that more than half-a-million children die or go blind each year. There’s a simple fix: vitamin A capsules that cost about 2 cents each.

I had planned this “win-a-trip” journey in part to introduce Paul to the problem of blindness as an element of global poverty. When I first visited West Africa myself as a backpacking law student, I was staggered and depressed by the blind beggars who circled me with outstretched palms.

So there we were, Paul and I, “enjoying” a 50-cent-per-person “breakfast” at a “restaurant” here in the town of Koundara in northern Guinea when we first came face to face with blindness on this trip.

(More here.)