Wet' AMD is rarer but much worse. New blood vessels form behind the retina, leaking onto the macula and rapidly destroying it. First, straight lines appear wavy. Fine detail fades. Readers can't focus on just one word and people's faces start to blur.
People gradually lose the ability to read or drive and often progress to blindness within two years.
Visudyne is for wet AMD cases only. Visudyne is light-activated. The drug is injected into the arm and then migrates into the abnormal blood vessels that destroy sight. Shine in a non-burning beam of light and the drug is activated, preventing the growth of those blood vessels without hurting surrounding tissue. He estimated that of the 200,000 new AMD cases a year, about 30 percent of patients could qualify for Visudyne.