Be cautious of worsening myopia during holidays; choose electronic devices for children in this way

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The Beijing Municipal Education Commission issued a notice requiring that middle school students across the city not attend school starting from January 23; all final-term tasks for this semester are to be completed online. Meanwhile, all training institutions in the city must suspend all face-to-face training sessions and group activities. During the pandemic, due to prolonged time spent at home studying, smartphones, computers, and other electronic devices caught the attention of children and adolescents, thereby increasing the pressure to prevent myopia among them. At the 13th Health China·Healthy Home Appliance Development Forum and the launch event for the experts’ initiative on eye protection, organized by the People’s Daily Health app and Health Times, experts from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the China Electrical Apparatus Association, and the School of Optometry at Peking University offered suggestions on how to prevent an increase in myopia among children during holidays. In particular, parents are advised that when choosing electronic devices for their children, the preferred order should be ultra-short-throw laser TVs, traditional projectors, regular TVs, desktop computers, laptops, tablets, and smartphones. The \"Guidelines for Protecting the Eyes of Primary and Secondary School Students and Young Children During the 2021 Winter Vacation\" issued by the Ministry of Education recently state that for online learning, electronic devices with larger screens and higher resolutions should be chosen. Xu Zuyan, an expert in laser technology and an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, pointed out that laser TVs emit softer light, resulting in less visual stimulation. Moreover, laser TVs have a brightness of between 300 and 400 nits, which allows for rich color variations and provides high viewing comfort. The increasingly widespread digital lifestyle poses a significant challenge to maintaining healthy eyesight. In the first half of 2020, the myopia rate among primary and secondary school students in China increased by 11.7%, with excessive use of electronic devices being one of the key reasons. Experts attending the meeting noted that to curb the rising trend of myopia, it is first necessary to strictly limit the amount of time children spend using electronic devices such as smartphones and tablets each day, keeping it within the maximum limits recommended by experts. Zhao Mingwei, executive dean of the School of Optometry at Peking University Health Science Center and director of the Ophthalmology Department at Peking University People’s Hospital, advises that if online learning is necessary, primary school students should, in principle, spend no more than 2.5 hours per day in front of screens, with each session lasting no more than 20 minutes ； For middle school students, it should not exceed 4 hours per day, and no more than 30 minutes per session. Experts recommend that, during the pandemic and while trying to avoid crowded places, parents should ensure that their children have at least 2 hours of outdoor activity per day. They also advise children who already suffer from myopia to spend more than 3 hours outdoors each day, in order to prevent the progression of myopia. Ma Aiping, reporter from Science and Technology Daily (Editors: Hao Mengjia, Shen Yaxin)