One out of every 1,000 children born in the world has a congenital defect known as clubfoot that causes their feet to turn inward. The relatively common disability is easy to treat without surgery, but fixing it can cost $300-$700 and requires children to wear a cumbersome orthopedic brace. Luckily, as Wired reports, Stanford students Jeff Yang and Ian Connolly have teamed up with the non-profit miraclefeet to develop a toy-like brace that only costs $20. “We wanted to develop something highly functional, elegant, but using same visual language as a child’s toy,” Connolly told Wired. As you can see in the video above, kids can happily teeter on the light plastic rod without any assistance. That’s a welcome alternative to clunky and expensive metal braces. The Stanford pair hope to get their invention into production soon.
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