Driving school for the aged

 

 It is a serious problem. Old people cause traffic accidents.

 In Japan, people over 70 years old who have driver’s licenses need to attend elderly training. I am not 70 years old, but I have already taken elderly training twice. I took them with my parents.

 My mother did not drive a car, but she had a license. I did not plan to renew her license because she had Alzheimer’s disease. I was personally interested in the elderly training system. At the beginning of the training, the trainer showed 10 pictures. Then he let the people memorize those pictures. They had to write them down on their papers without seeing the pictures. This was a test for Alzheimer’s disease. Of course, my mother could never remember even one of the pictures. The results of the other tests were worse.

 I assumed the trainer would take away her license, but they simply recommended that she go to a hospital. She already commuted to a hospital. So nothing had happened.

 My father’s case was a little bit different. While I was waiting for the training in the room, a trainer said, “We can’t accept any attendant in this training.” Then he let me out of the room. So I waited outside. Ten minutes later, the trainer came out from the room and asked me. “Your father is angry for some reason. Please handle it.” I entered the room. It was the middle of the 10-picture memorization test. My father was hard of hearing; he could not hear what the trainer said, and he did not know what he should write down. I knew the test very well because I already took it with my mother. So I explained what he should do with a loud voice. Talking to a person who is hard of hearing requires some training. My father’s results were also bad, but they could not take his license away. Nothing happened.

 My father passed away when he was 80 years old. He kept on driving until two days before he died. He caused many small accidents. The doctors, policemen, and our family all tried to stop him from driving. He refused. He died of a heart attack. When I found out he passed away, I breathed a sigh of relief that he finally will not cause serious accidents.

 We really need self-driving cars.

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Picture by Asa