Green Eyes: Disposable Contact Lenses
Can you think of anything more agonizing that cleaning your contact lenses? Well, behold the brilliance of disposable contact lenses. They never need to be cleaned. Ever. At the end off the day you simply dispose of them. No fuss, no extra cleaners, no cases needed. You can save on the cost of multi-purpose solutions and enzymatic cleaners. The cost-benefit savings are passed along to the consumer.
It’s a difficult sell, but people with sensitive eyes take heed. Rather than deal with the constant discomfort of contact lenses, people with sensitive eyes are opting for glasses rather than any kind of contact lenses. To be sure, glasses allow a great deal of oxygen to reach your eyes. But with disposable contact lenses, consumers have a comfortable, gas-permeable alternative to standard contacts.
By contrast, disposable lenses are the most gas-permeable form of contact available anywhere in the world. This is a due to the fact that disposable lenses are much thinner than conventional contacts. This allows more oxygen and moisture to reach the eye. Indeed, though they are extremely comfortable, they are extremely fragile and tear easily if you try to clean them with solution.
Chances are you will seldom, if ever, see “disposable” and “green” in the same sentence. Indeed, going through a box of contact lenses in a few months may bother environmentally conscious consumers. Disposable anything tends to run contrary to the image of otters at play in fresh, clean streams. But with the introduction of silicone hydrogels in 1999, contact lenses have become extremely biodegradable. In fact, the use of silicone hydrogels has made it possible to manufacture and market disposable contact lenses.
An average six-month supply runs about 20-40% more than a comparable pair of conventional contacts. In the face of having to pay more, many people opt for the conventional lenses, forgetting to take the cost of all the peripherals into account. At $10 for a bottle for solution every two weeks, that comes to about $260. Add another $10 every two months for enzymatic cleaner and now your grand total is $320. That’s roughly $600 a year in cleaning supplies alone. With disposables you simply wear and toss.
Save yourself the hidden costs and irritation and invest in a supply of disposable contact lenses. They are, hands down, the most comfortable contact on the market today.
