Sir,
We thank Mr Finlay1 for drawing your readers attention to the inherent dangers of Spey casting while fly fishing, and indeed the general danger to the eye from any form of fishing, from his own personal experience. It is interesting to note that injuries from fishing accounted for 1% of all those reported injuries in the 2009 Scottish Ocular Trauma Study (unpublished data) and 1.7% in the 1992 Scottish Ocular Trauma Study.2
We are aware that the American Academy of Ophthalmology is involved in eye injury prevention with their ‘EyeSmart’ program (http://www.geteyesmart.org/eyesmart/), and acknowledge that similar campaigns in the UK (http://www.rnib.org.uk/eyehealth/lookingafteryoureyes/Pages/safe_eyes.aspx) have had a prominent role in eye injury prevention, but we would urge caution on focusing on a specific area like fishing without gathering more evidence of the incidence of injury and risk involved.
References
Finlay RD . Preventable eye injuries while fly fishing. Eye 2014; 28: 775.
Desai P, MacEwen CJ, Baines P, Minassian DC . Incidence of cases of ocular trauma admitted to hospital and incidence of blinding outcome. Br J Ophthalmol 1996; 80 (7): 585.
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Morris, D., Desai, P. & MacEwen, C. Response to ‘Preventable eye injuries while fly fishing’. Eye 28, 775–776 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/eye.2014.58
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/eye.2014.58