Health issues faced by truck and other commercial vehicle drivers in India are often ignored. This highly fragmented sector (+85% vehicles owners have less than 5 trucks) is fraught with several health issues related to vehicle drivers.
An IMRB study in 2018 found that more than 53% of drivers surveyed had health issues ranging from body pains, stomach disorders, lack of sleep, mental stress and physical exhaustion.
This problem gets compounded when you consider the lack of medical support, health insurance and poor work conditions. Mostly long haul drivers face these issues. However we find that small commercial vehicle drivers, driving within city, three wheeler drivers are also facing health issues from handling heavy traffic, pollution, harassment by police and poor vehicle conditions.
Most of the IC vehicles, particularly diesel ones have high noise and vibration. The NVH issues get more aggravated as the vehicles start ageing.
This is one aspect EV solves for the users. The silent and vibration less vehicle is a boon to the driver who has to drive more than 8 hours a day in city traffic.
Our field data shows drivers using OSM 3 wheelers are in better physical and mental status than using IC vehicles. The continuous throbbing noise of diesel engine alongwith high vibration creates tremendous fatigue for the body.
In India we have almost 400,000 accidents in a year, in which almost 150,000 people loose their lives. Data shows a large number of accidents are caused by lack of sleep of drivers.
Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) is a condition caused by continuous drowsiness during day time as a result of lack of adequate night sleep. This results from uncomfortable driving conditions related stresses due to noise, vibration etc.
He is happy to note the positive feedback from our driver partners on this aspect. EVs have several indirect benefits, driver health improvement being one. A healthy and physically fit driver is an asset to the logistics as well as healthcare sector.
As India adds huge amount of high-speed highways, road network, we will need a large community of healthy drivers driving safely.
OSM is continuously working to improve upon this area. For us human aspect is the most important aspect of any business we are in. It comes first and foremost to Anglian Omega.
Authored by Uday Narang
Founder at Omega Seiki Mobility
