The British National Health Service recently announced and odd treatment schedule for patients suffering from age-related macular degeneration, which is the leading cause of blindness in developed countries.
The NHS has decided that it will only approve treatment for macular degeneration once the disease is present in both eyes, and then it will only treat the eye that has been damaged the least with no treatment being recommended for the other eye.
Treatment for macular degeneration is widely available in the United States, Canada and most European countries, but apparently the British health system balks at the cost.
Source:
Outrage over blindness guidelines. The BBC, June 13, 2002.