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I am very pleased to have once again accepted to preside at the award ceremony of the Champalimaud Prize for Vision, the highest worldwide honour in the area of ophthalmology and in the fight against blindness.

We are witnessing today the fifth successive year that materializes the wishes of António Champalimaud – a Portuguese individuality – who dreamed that one day he would be able to contribute towards the health and well being of all those who suffered visual deficiencies all over the World.

This dream became true with the creation of this prize and in the attribution of a relevant monetary amount to the cause of the fight against blindness that is avoidable or possibly the object of treatment.

António Champalimaud provided an example of great humanitarian sensibility and of great social responsibility that not only ennobles the founder of the Institution that is presided by Dr. Leonor Beleza with wisdom and dedication, but also brings great prestige to Portugal, through the stimulus and contribution that this prize represents for the development of scientific research, to technological development and to global cooperation.

We are at this moment facing an initiative of the Champalimaud Foundation with great international projection, such as the Research Centre that I had the honour to open last year and that houses basic and clinical scientists and researchers who, whether working on neurosciences or cancer, produce and apply science for people’s well being.

The Champalimaud Foundation, under the drive of Dr. Leonor Beleza has been developing efforts in order to attain research proximity between basic research and the sick, between clinical research and treatment of the sick, and endeavouring to maximize the possibility of achieving diagnoses and solutions for current clinical issues in the scientific areas to which it is dedicated.

The direct impact of the research carried out by the Champalimaud Foundation, in people’s health and well being, does not escape from the eyes of the World and its global perspective is viewable through the annual prize that it alternately awards to those who are singled out in the social intervention of fighting blindness and those that are noted for research in this area.

In this year of 2011, the Champalimaud Prize for Vision distinguishes the African Programme for the Control of Onchorcersiasis (APOC), a programme of great humanitarian reach, destined to cover tens of millions of people, 99% of which live in endemic areas of the African continent, where this parasitic sickness has devastating consequences.

This programme to control the so called “river blindness” is put into practice under an innovative system, through community based mechanisms, involving the sick populations themselves in the distribution of the specific medical drug for the treatment of this form of blindness.

APOC, with operational headquarters in Burkina Faso, has the support of prestigious organizations involved in this battle: the World Health Organization, the World Bank, the Health Ministries of the developing countries, several non governmental organizations that fight against blindness and a pharmaceutical company that distributes to the WHO, without costs and for this specific programme, the medical drug it researched and which is the only one that exists for the treatment and control of this sickness.

The fight against this type of blindness, avoidable and curable, is a gigantic work in the face of a fearful situation of social inequality.

It is a very expressive sickness in the whole of the African continent, especially in West Africa where, in the endemic areas, populations are infected when 14-15 years old and become blind before they are 30.

I cannot but assert what, for me and for most of the Portuguese, represents the carrying out of this programme in countries such as Guinea, Angola and Mozambique, with whom Portugal has very friendly bonds.

Ladies and gentlemen,

The António Champalimaud Prize for Vision was born out of a wish to aid the numerous organizations or groups that distinguish themselves due to their exceptional contributions towards the understanding of vision mechanisms or to the fight against blindness in developing countries.

Annually, millions of people all over the World are tragically deprived of vision; however, the majority of blindness cases are avoidable.

The endeavour and drive of all the analysed and selected organizations by the Jury for this Prize is immense and globally extremely relevant.

All the men and women who dedicate their lives to aid others in the fight against blindness can be classified as heroes.

This Prize is for them, for those who have never given up the fight to guarantee improved health and well being conditions for the weaker and less favoured of the world in which we live.

Thank you very much