These statistics will keep Fort Lauderdale personal injury lawyers, and lawyers across the country, busy for a long time if something is not done to regulate those older drivers who are no longer capable of driving safely.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, by the year 2030, they project and will be 9.6 million people over the age of 85, that’s an increase of 73 percent from today.  By that same year, road safety analyses predict that all the baby boomers will be at least 65; they will be responsible for at least 25 percent of all fatal car crashes.  Eleven percent of fatal car crashes involved drivers that old in the year 2005.

According to a Fort Lauderdale injury lawyer, there has been only one successful scientifically proven method to lower the rate of fatal car accidents involving seniors and that is to force them to appear at the motor vehicle departments in person to renew their license.  The Institute for Highway Safety (HIS) agrees with this determination wholeheartedly, citing a 1995 study in the Journal of American Medicine Association that basically repeated the same warning.

Most states do not require their senior citizens to pass a road test in order to renew their driver’s license.  If they did so, it would be critical in helping to identify those senior drivers whose mental awareness or physical ability has diminished enough that it is a danger for them to be behind the wheel of a vehicle.

Florida does require that individuals 80 years and older pass a vision test before they can renew their driver’s license and this results in approximately 7 percent of the elderly peoples seeking renewals being denied.