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The following tables summarise the cost estimates derived from the Costs of Blindness survey of Foundation members.

These are annualised costs and show the split between financial and time costs and the allocation of cost burden between the individual (including their families) and society. Note, that other societal costs such as Total Mobility, medical costs and costs of providing benefits are reviewed in separate sections of the report.

Education costs are omitted as figures for the total blind and vision impaired populations in education have not been able to be accessed by the research team. It is believed that such information is able to be provided by the Tertiary Education Commission but was unable to be provided for use in this research. In place of this a population estimate of blind and vision impaired students totalling 850 (primary through to tertiary) has been generated from information provided by the VEA and Disability Support Services at the University of Auckland. Please see Section 6 for discussion of education costs. This is an area which would require further investigation (please see separate document: 'Data Collection Issues Encountered During the RNZFB Costs of Blindness Research').

These tables (Tables 50, 51 and 52) do not include data collected from other secondary sources such as RNZFB costs, government and council costs (in terms of subsidies or other costs) outside what was reported by respondents in the Costs of Blindness survey. These have not been included because of the lack of information in terms of either detail or consistency (please see separate document: 'Data Collection Issues Encountered During the Costs of Blindness Research'). As such, discussions of identified and accessible secondary source information on societal costs are addressed throughout this report. No attempt to collate or integrate this secondary source data with the information derived from the Costs of Blindness Survey has been made due to issues as above.

It is important to note that these total figures cannot be used to derive a meaningful average cost per individual Foundation member. Average costs do not reflect the range of costs that can be experienced and that this range can vary greatly from individual to individual. For example, while some members may not experience a particular cost, for others this same cost may be high due to various contributing factors (e.g. age, living situation). Averaging out the costs therefore does not provide an accurate picture of the costs and the impact of these at an individual level.

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Total Cost Table 50: Total financial costs of blindness, by cost area activity, individual and society

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Total Cost Table 51: Total time costs of blindness by cost area activity, individual and society

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Total Cost Table 52: Total financial and time costs of blindness by cost area activity, individual and society

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