Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-07-20
C|TY'S STANDING
DUE TO VISION TEST
Importance of Good Eyesight
for AutoiStS Stressed by
0ptometrist.

The standing of Washington, D. C..
at the head of the traffic safety list
with fewer traffic fatalities per capita
than any other city of $4,000 or more
population must be attributed, at least
in part, to the rigid eyesight test each
applicant for a motor vehicle operators
permit is compelled to undergo, accord
ing to DR.. Edwin H. Silver, chairman
| of the motor vision commission of the
American Optometric Association. If
any proof to this effect is needed, DR..
Silver points out, it is contained in the
recently published figures, which show
Washington, with only 11.6 deaths per
| 100000 of population, leading the list,
while Cleveland, Ohio, with no eye
sight test, is at the bottom, with the
enormous total Of 1873 deaths per 100,-
900 Of population.
Good Vision Need.
Further importance of the need Of
adequate vision on the part of any
motor vehicle operator is contained in
figures from the University of Illinois,
which recently gave a physical exami-
nation to TIA faculty members and en-
ployes before permitting them to drive
university cars, DR.. Silver explains. The
figures, published in Street and Highway
Traffic News, show that there were "a,
or l in z, who needed visual correction
and did not know it. 1t was deemed
hazardous for of them, or / in %, to
drive without using glasses to correct
serious visual defects. There were 5
or l in 35 whose visual defects were too
serious to permit driving, even with the
aid of glasses.
These men and women, DR.. Silver
declares, represent typical cross-sec-
ton of American life. They ranged
from educated college professors to la
borerS around the university. The pro-
portion of those untitled for driving
through visual defects would probably
apply to the great majority of people
who daily are given permission to take
high-powered, fast machines out on the
public highways. And yet, DR.. Silver
says, only seven States and the District
of Columbia have any physical tests for
prospective drivers.
Plate Glass Used.
Manufacturers resorted to plate glass
for automobile because ordinary glass
was subject to defects and apt to give
the driver a distorted view of oncoming
Objects" DR.. Silver declares. 1.-THE hui
man eye is subject to the same defects
as the ordinary glass, and gives the
same distorted view as given by waves
or irregularities in that glass;" he says.
eff manufacturer sent cars into any
of those States that have no eyesight
test and equipped them with the old
time window glass, distorting every
thing viewed through it, he would soon
be put out of business by that State
and all others. But the same legisla-
tors who would bar that car from the
highways continue to allow persons with
equally distorted vision to that OBJ
tanned through such glass to operate
motor vehicles on their roads.
There must be some reason for the
difference in traffic fatalities between
Washington and Cleveland. Look at
the figures again. Washington, with
an eyesight test, had 11.6 traffic deaths
per 100000 of population; Cleveland,
which has no such test, had 1913 traffic
fatalities per 100000 of population
Boston, which comes under the Massa-
chusetts rigid eyesight test requirement,
had only 14.1 deaths per 100000, rank
ing next to the District
'I believe that If the District of CO.
lumbia eyeSight test for prospective mo-
tor vehicle operators couul be put into
effect in every State in the Union that
it would save from 5000 to 5000 lives
during the next year which are now lost
because of defects in the vision of one
or more of the persons involved in
traffic accidents"