Syria girl blinded in Beirut blast gifted prosthetic eye by UAE

A Syrian girl who lost one of her eyes as a result of the catastrophic blast in the Lebanese capital Beirut has been given a prosthetic eye by the United Arab Emirates.

As five-year-old Sama was at home with her family in Beirut on 4 August, 2,750 tonnes of ammonium nitrate stored at the city’s port exploded in a blast that shocked Lebanon and the international community.

Along with the almost 200 who were killed and 300,000 who were left homeless as a result of the blast, Sama lost her left eye when a glass shard from her home window blinded it, after which doctors said they were unable to save it.

Following the explosion, numerous countries delivered aid supplies and funding to the destroyed Lebanese capital, the UAE among them.

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As part of those efforts, Sheikha Fatima Bint Mubarak – the wife of the UAE’s founder and late Abu Dhabi emir Sheikh Zayed – started an initiative in which she ordered a plane carrying 100 tonnes of medical and nutritional supplies to be sent to Beirut.

As president of the UAE’s Supreme Council for Motherhood and Childhood, the supreme chairwoman of the Family Development Foundation, and president of the General Women’s Union, she also sponsored the medical treatment and rehabilitation of some of those who were injured.

Among those helped by the initiative was Sama, who was given a prosthetic eye to replace her blinded left eye.

Her family thanked the Emirates and Sheikha Fatima for their help and for covering the expenses for the treatment. Her mother said: “My daughter lost her eye in the explosion in Beirut. Now she has been fitted with a [prosthetic] eye and I thank Sheikha Fatima and the UAE for that. She is really happy now…she was happy to remove her bandages.”

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