IMPACT was born in 1985 when the respected disability prevention campaigner, Sir John Wilson, supported by his wife Lady Wilson and daughter Claire Hicks, applied his experience of blindness prevention in Africa and Asia to other needless disabilities around the world.
The beginning
The UN declared 1983-1992 as the UN Decade of Disabled Persons and, seizing the opportunity, Sir John and Lady Wilson, with others, including several UN agencies, launched IMPACT.
1981 was the United Nation’s International Year of Disabled Persons and, for the first time, shone a spotlight on the global scale of disability. 10% of the world’s people were disabled. More than 30% were children. The majority lived in low-income countries. Disability perpetuated poverty and poverty caused disability.
Thanks to advances in technology and medicine, most of this disability could have been prevented or could be treated, often at low cost. The human and economic imperative was hard to ignore and the time had come to take action.
Sir John Wilson, a leading British campaigner, convened a group of experts – chaired by former Prime Minister Lord Home – at Leeds Castle in November 1981 to consider practical measures to prevent needless disability.
The idea of preventing disability (rather than treating disability as an inevitable condition to be managed) was gaining traction.
The early years
Never wanting a top-down approach, Sir John helped to establish autonomous national IMPACTs - most of them in countries of the global south. Empowering local people to help themselves was a revolutionary idea in a time when traditional notions of ‘charity’ from rich benefactors to poor beneficiaries was the norm
The first IMPACT project took place in New Delhi, India in October 1983. Across Africa and Asia, early initiatives tackled Polio and launched mobile clinics to take medical care to people who had never seen a doctor before. Surgery to restore sight, hearing or mobility and training local medical teams changed individual lives and filled skills gaps for the long-term. Opening clinics in rural areas and providing medical equipment built infrastructure, often in areas without roads or resources.
In the UK, ‘Operation Cataract’ challenged and changed clinical practice for cataract operations within the NHS by removing the need for a long post-operative stay in hospital. IMPACT UK was also instrumental in securing routine vaccination of girls against Rubella. This has protected countless future babies from needless disability developed before birth.
Sir John’s ambitious vision was for nothing less than an end to needless disability.
Community-based disability prevention
Much of IMPACT’s work entails straightforward, low-cost initiatives in impoverished communities designed to prevent needless disability simply and with the input of local people.
Standalone activities have been added to over time to create a comprehensive package of care that makes a real difference to the health – and therefore wealth – of people in a given area.
For example, IMPACT Bangladesh’s small malnutrition prevention programme in Chuadanga district, which was launched in 1993, has grown to become a comprehensive community healthcare and health education programme with a modern hospital at its heart. Approximately 100,000 people benefit each year.
Taking the Hospital to the People
IMPACT’s Lifeline Express hospital train took to India’s famous rail network in 1991 and was followed in 1999 by the Jibon Tari (Boat of Life) floating hospital on Bangladesh’s vast rivers
The Lifeline Express and Jibon Tari are fully equipped modern hospitals, which travel nationally taking surgery and medical care into remote areas. Sight, hearing and mobility is restored and cleft lip repaired before the hospitals move on to the next location.
This approach has been replicated many times in many countries from additional Lifeline Express trains in China and a portable surgical tent in Nepal, to mobile clinics in 4x4s in Kenya and Bangladesh. It complements our fixed location, community-based initiatives well and means IMPACT’s work can reach evermore people.
Today
Sir John Wilson sadly passed away in 1999 but IMPACT’s work today retains Sir John’s original spirit and ethos.
The World Bank estimates that one billion people (15% of the global population) is disabled. Some of this is due to an ageing population but age-old causes (malnutrition, lack of medical care during childbirth, infections etc.) remain significant. The need for our work is as great in the 21st Century as it was in 1981.Today there are IMPACT Foundations in Bangladesh, Cambodia, East Africa (Kenya), India, Nepal, Norway, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Switzerland, Thailand, The Philippines, The UK and Zanzibar. IMPACT UK also supports non-IMPACT partners in Cambodia, India and Tanzania.
IMPACT’s action continues to grow and diversify and today includes innovations such as a Nursing Institute in Bangladesh to meet the huge need for qualified nurses; safe water sources and sanitation; and menstrual hygiene to help girls stay in school all month.
In addition to raising funds to invest in practical action overseas, IMPACT UK also runs a successful healthy nutrition project in West Sussex. We were delighted when the ‘Tasty Team’ was awarded the prestigious Queen’s Award for Voluntary Service (known as the MBE for volunteer groups) in 2017.
Tomorrow
Thanks to Sir John Wilson, IMPACT led the way in the prevention of needless disability in the 1980s and will continue to do so in the future.
‘John’s method of work was holistic, innovative and practical. Our mantra became: Action today to prevent disability tomorrow.
We travelled widely, helping to establish IMPACT Foundations in Africa and Asia which became a family – each helping the other. This is still our philosophy today.
IMPACT was first housed in our home. Now we have a modest office and take pride in our low administrative costs.Over 30 years I have had the privilege of seeing your financial support turned into sight, hearing and mobility. May I thank you on behalf of those men, women and children whose lives you have transformed. We face the challenges and opportunities of the future with confidence thanks to your support and encouragement.’
Lady Wilson
President, IMPACT UK
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