Colour Blind Awareness

What is colour blindness?

Colour (color) blindness (colour vision deficiency, or CVD) affects approximately 1 in 12 men (8%) and 1 in 200 women in the world. In Britain this means that there are approximately 3 million colour blind people (about 4.5% of the entire population), most of whom are male. Worldwide, there are approximately 300 million people with colour blindness, almost the same number of people as the entire population of the USA!

There are different causes of colour blindness. For the vast majority of people with deficient colour vision the condition is genetic and has been inherited from their mother, although some people become colour blind as a result of other diseases such as diabetes and multiple sclerosis or they acquire the condition over time due to the aging process, medication etc.

Causes of Colour Blindness

Colour blindness is a usually a genetic (hereditary) condition (you are born with it). Red/green and blue colour blindness is usually passed down from your parents. The gene which is responsible for the condition is carried on the X chromosome and this is the reason why many more men are affected than women. The inheritance process is explained in more detail in the section Inherited Colour Vision Deficiency.