My Grandma lived with my family and I most of my life. She drove to the beauty salon every Saturday morning at 10 am for her weekly appointment. If she got in the car for anything else it was a rare and special occasion. So, even though she started having a few minor accidents no one felt the need to talk to her about giving up driving, or maybe they didn’t want to approach her about giving up her freedom. Then one day she had an accident. A really bad accident. She thought she saw a dog run across the road, but there wasn’t a dog. She hit a tree. She broke her neck and ribs, had internal bleeding, and a brain injury. She was so close to death, but lived with injuries that required her to have to go to a nursing home. Her story is not an unfamiliar one. Many elderly people have suffered, or inflicted serious injury or death upon themselves or others. The license renewal process for the elderly population needs reformed, the elderly are making up …show more content…
In 1995 people aged 65 and over made up 13% of the population, by the year 2020 that percentage will increase to 17-20%. In three years the number of people age 65 and over will reach 50 million. (Cobb 1) This number alone should encourage us to engage in a discussion about the safety of elderly drivers, and cause us to explore facts and possible techniques to ensure that people will not be driving at the risk of their safety, or the safety of others. According to research done by the government accountability office people of age 75 and older account for 7.7 fatal crashes per 100 million miles traveled. The next closest age group at 7.0 are those age 16-24, which includes newly licensed drivers. (“What Age Groups Pose a Risk?”) A simple fact of aging is that it begins to affect you whole body, as a natural progression of life your whole body starts to