Blind to the truth
Re: "DLT to allow online licence renewals", (BP, Feb 17).
I'm happy to hear the DLT is working with medical professionals to revise guidelines for physical fitness testing to ensure all drivers meet standardised physical and visual fitness requirements. Hopefully the revision will result in the abolition of the pointless and discriminatory colour blindness test.
Approximately 8% of males of European descent, 4-5% of Asian males and 3-4% of African males are affected by colour blindness (Colour Vision Deficiency or CVD).
While the ability to discriminate between colours, in particular red and green, is clearly important in certain professions such as air traffic control, train driving and medical technology, colour vision has little impact, if any, on the ability to drive a car for private use, as drivers can easily use the position of lights (top/middle/bottom) to drive safely.
This is confirmed by research studies, which show there is no significant difference in accident rates between colour-blind drivers and so-called "colour-normal" drivers. This is recognised by many countries such as Australia, the USA and most EU countries, and the global trend is towards removing colour vision restrictions for private car licences.
The proposed review presents a good opportunity for the DLT to remove the outdated and unfair requirement for a colour blindness test as a condition for obtaining a car driving licence. Given Thailand's high rate of traffic accident mortality, the DLT should instead focus on addressing the factors that really contribute to dangers on the roads. Colour blindness is not one of these.
