Colour Blindness Awareness Day- What do you see?
Colour Blindness Awareness Day falls on 06 September.
Here are some interesting facts about colour blindness:
About 1 in 12 men are colour blind, whereas only about 1 in 200 women are colour blind. This is due to the genes for colour blindness residing in the X-chromosome and it being a recessive trait. Women, having 2 copies of X-chromosomes, need both X-chromosomes carrying the recessive traits to be affected by colour blindness.
16% of women worldwide are carriers for the colour blindness genes. They are not colour blind though one copy of their X-chromosomes carries the colour blindness genes, which can be transmitted to their children.
People with red-green colour blindness:
See blue as a richly saturated colour.
See the green traffic signal as a very pale green or white light.
Are not able to see different shades of red, it is therefore difficult for them to determine if their meat is cooked enough.
During World War II, people with colour blindness were sent for aerial surveillance because they could better see camouflaged vehicles. Colour blind people do not see the different colour patterns in camouflage that distract the eye from seeing the shape of the concealed object.
In 1875, nine people were killed in a fatal railway accident in Sweden. It was believed that a colour blind rail operator failed to read a coloured signal properly that led to the accident. A colour vision test was developed after that to test railroad workers for colour blindness.
Dogs, cats and rabbits are colour blind and see mostly grey. Monkeys have strong color vision. Bees and butterflies have superb vision that allow them to see colours beyond that of the human vision.
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