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As children lose their vision, family embarks on tour of the world

Empty airport road
Posted at 1:27 PM, Sep 13, 2022
and last updated 2022-09-13 15:27:16-04

A Canadian family is planning to travel the world with their children after learning that three of their four children are slowly losing their vision.

According to CNN,the children of Edith Lemay and Sebastien Pelletier were diagnosed with retinitis pigmentosa. According to the National Institutes of Health, retinitis pigmentos is a genetic disorder that causes most people to eventually go blind. The NIH noted that there is no known cure for the disorder.

Most of the time, the NIH said, the disorder is passed through the genes of the parents.

A specialist recommended to the parents to engross their daughter Mia with as many visual memories as possible.

"I thought, 'I'm not going to show her an elephant in a book, I'm going to take her to see a real elephant," Lemay told CNN. "And I'm going to fill her visual memory with the best, most beautiful images I can."

While Pelletier received good fortune after a company he owned shares in was bought, the pandemic set their travel plans back.

With the world reopening following the pandemic, the family is trying to visit as many places as possible.

"With the diagnosis, we have an urgency," Pelletier told CNN. “There's great things to do at home, but there's nothing better than traveling.”

The family has been documenting their travels on Facebook. Most recently, they wrote about their visit to Mongolia.