Opinion: Danger at the wheel

Police in St. Petersburg and Santa Monica may never determine exactly why two drivers, one 60 and the other 86, lost control of their cars, but the results were deadly and dangerous. That these drivers bore no malicious or reckless intent also reflects the difficulty their actions pose to those who regulate highway safety.

In St. Petersburg, Joseph Pastore veered into a pack of bicyclists who were traveling toward him in the opposite lane, injuring 14 of them. Police tested him for alcohol and illicit drugs, and found none. Instead, Pastore, 60, was ailing and on prescription medications, and says he momentarily blacked out.

In Santa Monica, Calif., Russell Weller left the post office and barreled down a road that was closed that day for use as a farmers market, killing 10 people and putting 20 more in the hospital. Police there also found no alcohol or drugs in his bloodstream. They think that Weller, 86, may have accidentally hit the accelerator, rather than the brake, when he saw the people on the street.

What is clear is that neither man belonged behind the wheel of a car. What is less clear is how families and state motor vehicle licensing agencies are supposed to stop them.

Most states have become more aggressive, and appropriately so, with the licensing of new drivers. Some 35 states now slow down the process for 16-year-olds, offering driving privileges in increments as they reach 18, and those policies have been credited with reducing the extraordinarily high rate of accidents for teenagers. States have been slower, however, to deal with the other age group that exhibits a high accident rate. A study by the Insurance Institute of Highway Safety reports that, per miles driven, drivers 75 years and older have more fatal accidents than any other group except teenagers.

In Florida, which has more than 1.2-million drivers who are over 75, lawmakers took a first step this year toward better oversight of elderly drivers. The law now requires a vision test for anyone who wants to renew their license after the age of 79.

Vision is only one of the impairments that can cause accidents, though, and vision problems are by no means limited to those who are advanced in their years. Most drivers can go 18 years without so much as a vision test, as long as their driving record is clean. Their driving fitness is generally checked only once they have been in accidents, or sometimes when family members or physicians complain. That means the state has no way to monitor serious illnesses, impairments or prescription medications that could make a driver a potential menace on the road. The road test, perhaps the state's best gauge of any driver's ability, tends to be given at age 16 and no more.

The police may be called upon to investigate these horrifying accidents, but, in a society where the automobile is more than merely a symbol of independence, they can never provide all the answers.

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