Color Blindness

Is There a Solution for Color Blindness?

My grandfather once convinced an inscrutable hardware store owner during the Great Depression to hire him as a paint mixer despite one small fact—my grandpa was colorblind. He passed the test by memorizing the numbers at the tops of paint sample cards, and later did the same for traffic lights by memorizing their order. His color blind hi-jinks were mostly laughable—especially when he disastrously dressed himself in red and green colors far after the holiday season had ended. However, his color blindness wasn’t just all laughs (and some, though good-natured, indisputably at his expense)—because of his inability to distinguish red from green and brown, he was banned from entering the air force as he so dreamed.

Living With Color Blindness

Color blindness doesn’t tend to impact those afflicted too severely beyond the piloting barrier, joining the Air Force or Navy in particular—however, some countries like Romania and Turkey still refuse color blind persons drivers’ licenses. Piloting associations—the FAA in the U.S. and CAA in the U.K. are reviewing their flight tests to review their discrimination against color blindness, which has been protested as arbitrary to a real pilot’s ability.

Pet peeves for a color blind or (red-green) color-deficient individual might be that they cannot see the blood on rare cooked meat, or the ripeness of tomatoes. They sometimes cannot also distinguish between tomato sauce and chocolate syrup until they taste it! True to form, my kooky grandfather once loudly complained that someone had gotten chocolate sauce on his can opener.

Despite these small annoyances, color blind individuals are independent, capable members of society—but what causes color blindness in the first place? And can it potentially be reversed?

Color blindness is caused by a pigment insufficiency in the retina; our perception is determined by cone cells and rod cells located in the retina—the part of the eye that lets light in. Newton postulated that pressure on the retina jointly with light helps us see color. Rods help us see in low light, and cones in bright sunlight. Within the cells, they contain pigment that, as in a spectrum, are stimulated by colors. Red light stimulates cone cells more than any other shade, and an inability to see reds is the most common form of color blindness—this also affects orange and yellow, as yellow attracts red light most potently (counterintuitive, but true!)

So, can red-green color deficient people ever enjoy the same splash of rainbow as the rest of us, or are they doomed to a life of many shades of pea-green? Unfortunately, there is no known cure for color blindness—people with color blindness can opt to wear red-tint contact lenses, which work like 3D glasses to help different shades pop. Such color-enabling lenses are called “X-Chrom Lenses”

Transient, or Temporary, Color Blindness

It’s crucial to understand that transient achromatopsia, or a sudden inability to see color, is caused by a constricted blood vessel to the brain. If not examined by a physician, this sudden switch to grey shades could not only lead to a life less vibrant, but a stroke. Rarely, people with cerebral damage can have permanent achromatopsia, causing their lives to resemble a melodramatic film noir, however impeccable their normal nutrition & eye care routine.

Why are White Men More Genetically Predisposed to Color Blindness?

8 percent of Caucasian males lack the conic sensors that enable seeing a full spectrum of color, whereas only 1 in 200 women are colorblind—an exponentially smaller percentage. The “gene mutation” of color blindness is linked to the X gene—and since mens’ patterns are XY, they are more likely to carry it. Women, by contrast, with their XX genes won’t display a mutation if it’s only on one of their X’s—in order for it to show, it has to be on both, a very abnormal occurrence.

As for color blindness and its racial predisposition, we commonly hear pleas for metaphorical color blindness in all sorts of racial protest songs—which may have poignantly fallen on deaf ears at one point as famed racist Hitler was physically color blind. Additionally, very few African Americans suffer from color blindness—this could be because Caucasians lack color pigment. If this holds true, than persons with darker skin should then also be more enabled than whites to see bright colors…conspiracy?

Animals and Color Blindness

It’s often assumed that all animals are colorblind, which couldn’t be further from the truth. For instance, pigeons possess a blessed ability to distinguish between almost identical colors—a harsh truth for red-green color blind people who only have three shades of pea green on their palate. Some amphibians like frogs show a heightened ability to see the color of their normal environment—many frogs when tested show a preference to blue. Other reptiles, along with flying friends, bees, and especially hummingbirds, have sharpened visual ability to see ultraviolet rays, which humans can only simulate with groovy black lights.

Black and white color blindness is most common in cats and dogs, who have 7 times less conic ability and have “dichromatic” color blindness, only able to see blues and not reds.

Of all animals, color perception almost identical to humans’ appears in both goldfish and monkeys, who almost uniformly can see the three color classes through their receptors—red, blue, and yellow.

There may not be a cure for color blindness—yet—but laser optic center has the cure for ever other optic ailment. Call our number today to learn more about laser retina cleansing, the cure for near and far sightedness as well as the therapies available for people with astigmatism. After all, we may not be born with 20/20, but with a sharpened focus on treatments we can get there. Call the number listed today to learn more about viable color blindness laser treatment options! You can also click on our contact form for more…