Special Concerns While Driving: Older Drivers

Another special situation is older drivers. We all hope to live a long time and it’s great that our health care system is enabling more and more people to live into their eighties and nineties, and even longer. It’s also great that they have cars to maintain their independence and go where they need to. But as we advance in age, our faculties decline. Every year we’re not able to see or hear quite as well as we used to. Many senior citizens aren’t aware how much of their hearing and sight they’ve lost because it’s so gradual. To compound these safety problems, our reaction time is severely diminished as we get older. It’s an unfortunate, but all important, fact of life that many senior citizens keep their drivers’ licenses and continue to operate motor vehicles long past the point where they should safely do so. This is something that everyone on the road should be aware of.