The Trinidad and To­ba­go Blind Wel­fare As­so­ci­a­tion (TTB­WA) has called on the Gov­ern­ment to ex­tend its pro­posed ini­tia­tive to pro­vide Con­tin­u­ous Glu­cose Mon­i­tors (CGMs) to in­clude blind and vi­su­al­ly im­paired in­di­vid­u­als.

The re­quest fol­lows re­cent state­ments by Health Min­is­ter Dr Lack­ram Bo­doe, who in­di­cat­ed that the 2025/2026 na­tion­al bud­get may in­clude the pro­vi­sion of CGMs for chil­dren with Type 1 di­a­betes. The TTB­WA ac­knowl­edged the ini­tia­tive and urged that it be ex­pand­ed to cov­er blind per­sons liv­ing with di­a­betes.

Ex­ec­u­tive Of­fi­cer of the TTB­WA, Ken­neth Suratt, yes­ter­day said CGMs al­low re­al-time blood glu­cose mon­i­tor­ing through smart­phone apps that are com­pat­i­ble with screen read­ers.

He not­ed that tra­di­tion­al mon­i­tors re­quire vi­su­al in­ter­pre­ta­tion, forc­ing blind in­di­vid­u­als to de­pend on oth­ers for health man­age­ment.

CGMs pro­vide au­dio alerts when glu­cose lev­els are high or low, al­low­ing prompt re­sponse and re­duc­ing the risk of com­pli­ca­tions or hos­pi­tal vis­its.

Suratt stat­ed that the cost of CGMs—es­ti­mat­ed at $15,000 per year for re­place­ment sen­sors—makes them in­ac­ces­si­ble to most blind per­sons, many of whom de­pend sole­ly on the dis­abil­i­ty grant.

The TTB­WA is call­ing for CGMs to be in­clud­ed in the Chron­ic Dis­ease As­sis­tance Pro­gramme (CDAP) or sup­port­ed through the min­istry’s ac­ces­si­bil­i­ty and dis­abil­i­ty ser­vices.

Suratt said the in­clu­sion of CGMs would ad­dress health eq­ui­ty and sup­port the in­de­pen­dence and dig­ni­ty of blind cit­i­zens man­ag­ing di­a­betes.

The TTB­WA ex­pressed will­ing­ness to col­lab­o­rate with the Min­istry of Health and oth­er stake­hold­ers, such as the Di­a­betes As­so­ci­a­tion of Trinidad and To­ba­go, to en­sure eq­ui­table ac­cess to health tech­nol­o­gy for blind and vi­su­al­ly im­paired in­di­vid­u­als.

In a re­sponse, Bo­doe told Guardian Me­dia, “We ac­knowl­edge the unique chal­lenges faced by the blind and vi­su­al­ly im­paired com­mu­ni­ty in man­ag­ing chron­ic con­di­tions such as di­a­betes, and the Min­istry of Health re­mains com­mit­ted to a health­care sys­tem that is in­clu­sive, pa­tient-cen­tred, and re­spon­sive to the needs of all cit­i­zens.”

He said he al­so has a meet­ing re­quest from the as­so­ci­a­tion and in­tends to meet with them in the near fu­ture.