Vision Excellence Awards: Akef El-Maghraby

Dr Akef El-Maghraby is a distinguished ophthalmologist who established eye care hospitals and training centres to bring much-needed eye care services across Africa, the Middle East and Asia over the past fifty years. Each year, the network of eye hospitals he established provides quality eye care to over a million patients and performs over 120,000 sight-preserving surgeries. He has also founded five non-profit eye hospitals and centres in Bangladesh, North Yemen, Sudan, North Lebanon, Egypt, and Cameroon.

Dr El-Maghraby also founded the Magrabi Eye Foundation (first non-profit organization for prevention of blindness) in the Middle East. He co-founded the Middle East Journal of Ophthalmology, which is the only peer reviewed journal for ophthalmology in the Pan Arab Middle East and African regions. Dr. El-Maghraby Founded the Middle East African Council of Ophthalmology (MEACO) and was its President for 18 years. He is now MEACO Honorary President for Life. He is the former Vice-President of the International Council of Ophthalmology (ICO).

Dr El-Maghraby played a vital role in the uptake of VISION 2020 across the countries he worked in and has been instrumental to its success.