B2 – Upper Intermediate
Driving helps people in their senior years stay mobile and independent. However, the risk of being injured or killed in a motor vehicle crash increases as people age.
An article in the New England Journal of Medicine argues that “retirement from driving threatens one’s health and wellness.”
Watch the video to know more about it and be able to answer the questions that follow.
Discussion Questions:
- In your own personal view, are the elderly drivers still capable of driving? Should they be allowed to drive despite their age? Why or why not?
- As age affects driving ability, what should be done to maintain the safety driving on the road especially for the elderly?
- Do you agree that retirement from driving threatens one’s health and well-being? Explain your answer.
22 replies on “Right Time for Elderly To Hand Over Their Keys”
1. Personally, I think that driving properly, doesn’t depend on the age, it is related wiht people’s abilities. I mean, there are some people who should be retired their driving license due to their aggressive behaviour when they are sitting behind the wheel, it doesn’t matter the age.
2. I think that in order to ensure the wellbeing of all, we should all pass periodic control for driving skills. May be, for elderly it should be more frequent. Obiously these controls have to be done by a goverment service, not by a private company since it is possible that the certificate should be obtained only by paying for it.
3. Yes, every one wants to be more independient, and I think we need to feel that feeling to be mentally healthy and, if we are mentally healthy it is more probable that we feel better in every aspect of our live.
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My tought is that the capability to do anything, shouldn’t be measured by the age of people.
The evolution of the society is evolving faster and faster. Both cars and people are very different today than they were years ago.
If the elderly drivers of 90’s could drive twenty years ago cars without security systems like airbag, ABS etc. and many of them survived the road; Today while they are tested by the administration and they considered fit to drive I wouldn’t consider age as a problem at all.
Old people want to live their life like any other, because they just have one and they even know it better than young people.
Instead of being “paternalistics” with them we should put the technology like driving system assistance at your service. All of us will be old and also we’ll want to keep being independent.
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1. I think that the administration shouldn’t remove the driving license of a person only for its age. I think that it has to consider the abilities and capacities of the person. Maybe an elderly person has sufficient health and reflexes to drive. In any case, I think that when you are old you should pass some tests regularly and obligatorily, not only for the one’s security but for the security of all people on the road.
2. I think that clearly the age affects the health and to the ability for driving, however the elderly persons should pass a periodic control. This control must be done by the Administration don’t for a private company. The control should incorporate health, abilities and knowledge tests.
3. I think driving improves the autonomy of any person and it is a feature of well-being. There are too many things that can improve the well-being of a person. Although this is a little component, there are too many others. I think that this discussion should not be the center of well-being, there are other important things such as the public health system in the USA. Although it could be a factor, this discussion favors the car industry.
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1. I think they would be allowed as long as the have good physical condition and good cognition skills. No one that cannot move with agility or that haven’t a clear mind should be allowed to drive, independently of their age.
2. The problem is not only the elderly, there is a lot of people that lacks the respect for other drivers and drive like crazy as in a “Mad Max” film. The kamikazes can be spotted and avoided in time for young drivers, but the elders reduced cognition my fail when these people is on sight. Everyone with enough precautions and performing safe-driving should be allowed to drive.
3. Yes it is, because you become dependent on other people if you need to go somewhere and there is not a practical public transport alternative. Becoming a dependent person is always detrimental for your mental health. This could change with the arrival of autonomous driving and self-driven cars, in which there is no need to take the wheel for use a car.
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1. In your own personal view, are the elderly drivers still capable of driving? Should they be allowed to drive despite their age? Why or why not?
In my opinion, I think that when you get older, it is more dangerous to drive because you have not the same capacity in order to handle the driving in a good way. But, it depens on the person because some old people have good skills to drive even though they are old.
2. As age affects driving ability, what should be done to maintain the safety driving on the road especially for the elderly?
I think that it is necessary to do periodic examinations in order to check it the skill of driving is still good. If you don’t pass the exam, you won’t be able to drive.
3. Do you agree that retirement from driving threatens one’s health and well-being? Explain your answer
I think that it is important to do some things in order to test if a person has the skill to drive or not. If someone old is a threat, it is necessary its retirement in order to the well-being and the health of one’s and the rest of the citizenship.
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In my humble opinion, is not a matter of age is a matter of capabilities, and the discussion should be focused in the current medical checks for drivers that are currently the same for all ages. Bearing in mind the low rates of new borns and the longer lifetime expectation , the average age of the active drivers will be higher and higher, so the medical checks required to renew the driving license must be improved and adapted to this reality
About keep the driving capability along the years sounds good to have additional trainning available for anybody, not only for elder people, also for those younger ones that have not been driving in years and needs a refresh of the driving rules as well as some practice
I am fully agree that retirement from driving could impact in elder people health and well-being. As per what I saw in my own familiy the longer our elders be active in all aspects, better is their life quality. The key is find the balance between this and the capabilities , so fix an standard age for driving retirement for everybody would be the easiest but not the better solution
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1- IN your own personal view, are the elderly drivers still capable of driving? Should they be allowes to drive despite their age ? Why or not why?
I think that depend of the person, there are people that they are elderly but have all the senses good to drive, moreover normally they are more prudent that young people on the road. Although on the other hand when people are 80 or more years old their reflexes are get samaller and this is dangerous.
As age affect driving ability, what should be done to maintain the safety driving on the road specially for the elderly?
The administration should organize groups of driving classes for seniors, this way they wouldn’t forget the rules, also the administration should examine these people later, for example each five or six years after you are 70 years old.
Do you agree that retirement from driving threatens one’s health and well-being? Explain your answer.
Yes I do, because if you can drive your feel that you are independent for can go to different places and the elderly people can feel that they are able to continue doing things despite their age. These feelings are positive for the health and well-being.
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1- In your own personal view, are the elderly drivers still capable of driving? Should they be allowed to drive despite their age? Why or why not?
I think that age should not be the ultimate condition that determines if someone is able or not to drive. There are lots of elderly that still have the habilities required to drive, so I think that they should be allowed despite their age.
2- As age affects driving ability, what should be done to maintain the safety driving on the road especially for the elderly?
The most important measure that should be taken is to increase the peridodicity of driving tests to check the ability of the driver. As people get old, their skills diminish, so it is important to monitor this age group in order to prevent accidents. By doing this, many cases of people with driving difficulties could be detected before they become a real problem for road safety.
3- Do you agree that retirement from driving threatens one’s health and well-being? Explain your answer.
I am not sure if there is a link between retirement from driving and well-being, but I think that as people get older, keeping active is key to be capable of doing lot of things. When someone stops from doing something, it is easy for them to lose the ability to do it.
Taking away someone’s driver’s license is in someway a limitation that could cause that person to lose skills and abilities.
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1. In your own personal view, are the elderly drivers still capable of driving? Should they be allowed to drive despite their age? Why or why not?
As the drivers skills will depend mainly on the skills of each person more than its age, they are still capable of driving if they pass the driver tests with the stablished frequency by the goverments.
They should be allowed to drive if they demonstrate they are in good medical conditions.
As they said in the video, they are forty-year -old people with no driver skills at all. It doesnt depend on the age but in the conditions.
2. As age affects driving ability, what should be done to maintain the safety driving on the road especially for the elderly?
As it is said in the video , they are already some actions in place such the periodic tests at a certain age.
In addition I think it is a good idea to enable an exclusive safety lane for this people or people willing to drive at low speed.
In my opinion, as it is indicated when you are a new driver, it would be interesting to indicate that you are an elderly driver with a letter or a sign in your car.
3. Do you agree that retirement from driving threatens one’s health and well-being? Explain your answer
The life of the person could be highly impacted because of the loss of freedom.
We are not ready to accept that we are not longer able to be behind the wheel. Psychologically, it has to be very hard to accept that you have to hand over the keys, to give up driving.
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1) In your own personal view, are the elderly drivers still capable of driving? Should they be allowed to drive despite their age? Why or why not?
I’m afraid that this is not a matter of age but about skills and health conditions. However, everybody should go for a test to get the license renewed after 65/70 years old (when the reflects and driving abilities start decreasing), at least once a year or 2 years.
In addition, having more traffic restrictions for ALL drivers (no matter their age) could be helpful.
2) As age affects driving ability, what should be done to maintain the safety driving on the road especially for the elderly?
As mentioned above, after 65/70, everybody should go for the license test at least once a year or once every 2 years.
Healthcare institutions should be connected with the driving license institutions and share information about every single person with a driving license.
3) Do you agree that retirement from driving threatens one’s health and well-being? Explain your answer.
Yes, it may happen, unfortunately, because of a lack of independence.
At this point, if the governments decide to establish a rule or an age limit for elderly drivers, they should also offer possible solutions that compensate for this fact.
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In your own personal view, are the elderly drivers still capable of driving? Should they be allowed to drive despite their age? Why or why not?
In my personal standpoint I would say that each human being is different from others, you could know someone aged 90 and he or she could be still fine, whilst another one could have his or her reflexes impaired. I guess driving is not a matter of age but skills. In fact, there are 30-year-old people that shouln’t be driving because of their lack of required driving skills.
As age affects driving ability, what should be done to maintain the safety driving on the road especially for the elderly?
As the reporter says, preservation of speed limits is an effective way to keep roads safe for everyone. I would add slightly bigger traffic signs that could warn for a potential hazard and it could be seen from further afield.
Do you agree that retirement from driving threatens one’s health and well-being? Explain your answer.
I think that if the elderly hand over their keys whilst still preserve much of their reaction skills could be harmful due to the lack of independecy. On the other hand, if somebody is too deteriorated to drive, handing over the keys is the best measure to keep him/her away from dangers as to others.
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As the reporter says, preservation of speed limits is an effective way to keep roads safe for everyone. I would add slightly bigger traffic signs that could warn for a potential hazard and it could be seen from further afield.