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Fred Hollows
Fred Hollows (1929–1993)
Fred Hollows was born in Dunedin, New Zealand. He became a doctor and began to specialise in the treatment of diseases of the eye. He had to travel to England to do this and won a prize as one of the top students.
After he returned to Australia, Hollows spent a lot of his time studying and treating an eye disease called 'trachoma', which causes blindness if it is not treated quickly. Many Aboriginal people suffer from this disease.
Fred Hollows helped set up the Aboriginal Medical Service in Sydney and arranged for teams of people to travel all over the country to treat trachoma. This saved many people from becoming blind. He also helped to train doctors for work in Africa and set up a program to cure another common eye disease called 'cataracts'.
His work has been recognised in many ways. He was given a Human Rights Medal, an Australian Achiever Award, made Australian of the Year, given an Order of Australia Award and had a medical foundation named after him.
Fred Hollows