Actress Judi Dench battling Macular Degeneration

Oscar-winning actress Judi Dench acknowledged in an interview with the Daily Mirror that she suffers from macular degeneration and can no longer see faces in front of her or read scripts. However, she refuses to let the disease interfere with her acting career. Almost 240,000 people in the United Kingdom are affected by macular degeneration and it accounts for more than half of the registrations for blind and partially sighted people in the UK. Ms. Dench is affected by the wet form in one eye and the dry form in the other eye. She underwent injections in hopes of halting the progression of the wet form. Ms. Dench revealed that her mother had been afflicted with macular degeneration as well. With no plans to retire, Ms. Dench uses glasses and bright light to assist her and will be reprising her role of M in the next James Bond film which is set to be released November 9, 2012.*