Could this lead to tougher tests for older drivers

maybe but your claim doesn’t pass the sniff test. My wife and I have 4 late onset Alzheimer’s cases in our families (all post-75 diagnosis at least). Many of our friends have an Alzheimer’s parent. I don’t know of a single early onset case directly (though of course I read of a handful of celeb cases in the papers). They exist but are rare and no way a majority. It’s just a nonsense claim.

Assuming this image is correct (always a risk on the internet!) Alzheimer detection ramps up after 75:

(From: https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Age-specific-incidence-of-Alzheimers-disease-per-1000-personyears-across-continents_fig1_26655340)

My FiL had early-onset Alzheimer, I think he was 67 or so when it was detected. One of the first symptoms, incidentally, was that he was driving and couldn’t work out how to get off a roundabout.

Better than driving when not even knowing who you are though isn’t it. I am in same situation and would be reliant on taxis if I didn’t want to use the bus that comes once a day at 11:00 and returns once a day at 17:00 whereas compared to my mum who live in very concentrated town she has a bus to pretty much anywhere with a 30 minute wait.

Taxis?  You think taxis are available whenever you want them in rural areas?

And don’t ever think you’ll just ring up and get a taxi during either school drop-off (up to an hour before) or pick-up (up to an hour after).

The older folk I know (my Mum and her friends are all now 80’s thru 90’s) self-regulate their driving, they’re slowly giving up and none of them drive at night (as in when it’s dark – so their twice weekly afternoon walk & coffee meetup will start an hour early as of next week (clocks going back).  It’s also ‘handy’ that most of them drive equivalent-type cars, so when I come across an Aygo/Piccanto/Smart/etc etc doing 40mph on a NSL road with a driver I can barely see I pretty much know why, and they’re easy to overtake.

This for me is the majority, as just like when they were younger they didn’t break Rule #1.

We live rurally; bus services are only on the main roads between the main towns, taxis are limited (and expensive as they rarely get a return journey) and with lots of hills, single-track roads and often limited options between towns cycling is an enthusiast ‘occupation’ only  – consequentially folk are car-dependent.

On the flip side, deaths attributed to the roads are at historically low levels and to put it into perspective, approximately 10 folk a month die on Scottish roads vs the 5,000 or so total deaths.

And I go back to the case the OP linked to, she was already driving illegally (as she’d purposely cancelled her car insurance).

Wild prejudice abounds in this thread with a witch hunt on older drivers.

I’m not sure anyone is out on a witch hunt. People are pointing out (sometimes anecdotally, sometimes with citations) that older drivers are more likely to suffer from cognitive or physical decline affecting their driving – be that Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s or general frailty. There’s nothing witch hunting about pointing out simple facts like that.

With my grandfather, it was his eyesight initially. Cataracts. He got pulled over once for driving too slowly, turned out that in the headlight glare and rain he literally couldn’t see a thing. The policeman drove him home but for whatever reason that did not trigger a “holy shit, you shouldn’t be anywhere near a car!” discussion.

After he’d had his cataract operation he was a lot better but then everything declined slowly again.

We’re not happy about my Mum continuing to drive although she is so frail that she is totally reliant on her car. No diagnosis of Alzheimer’s though (she’s mid 70’s).

Would also be a requirement to have a functioning public transport system though so the elderly had a viable alternative.

There is also an element* of choice as to where you live out your later years, shouldn’t be just down to the public purse if you choose to live way out in the sticks.

* I am aware that proportions of the population don’t have a choice in where they might live.

https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/alzheimers-disease/

Who is affected?
Alzheimer’s disease is most common in people over the age of 65.

The risk of Alzheimer’s disease and other types of dementia increases with age, affecting an estimated 1 in 14 people over the age of 65 and 1 in every 6 people over the age of 80.

But around 1 in every 13 people with Alzheimer’s disease are under the age of 65. This is called early- or young-onset Alzheimer’s disease.

I’d start with insisting on an eye test every 5 years with The results formally submitted to the DVLA. If you need glasses it could be logged against your licence. Would also pick up peopke who shouldn’t be driving due to other eye issues. Get caught driving without glasses on would invalidate your insurance on the spot.

Id then move to simulator based testing every 10 years reducing to 5 from 65.

Id also enforce speed limits and other rules of the road ensuring those caught pay for the service. Not difficult just wildly unpopular.

Id also enforce speed limits and other rules of the road ensuring those caught pay for the service. Not difficult just wildly unpopular.

More than happy with this suggestion.

There is also an element* of choice as to where you live out your later years

this. People “retiring to the country” and *choosing* to live somewhere they are completely reliant on a car is mad.

You can’t expect someone who has a mental impairment (diagnosed or not) to make the decision to tell dvla – so someone else should assess that.  And it’s common enough in the over 80s that the sheriff believed without change the same thing could happen again.….

We have built a society based on car travel for the past 50 years, it isn’t any wonder that the elderly are reluctant to give up their cars when that creates a level of isolation from the services they need and activities they can still enjoy.

two comments from posts above. You cant expect people to self assess their cognitive decline – as quite a few of us have mentioned in this thread our own parents have either been ignorant of or in denial about their health. Add to that a lifetime of being sold a car as a measure of status and independence (and in many cases a real, if sometimes self imposed by choice of home location, element of isolation without use of a car) the current self assessment approach is broken.

it’s becoming more of an issue because cars are more powerful, and people are living longer so more are affected by cognitive decline than before.

if a single airline pilot or train driver had done this there would be a major review and processes would change

if a single airline pilot or train driver had done this there would be a major review and processes would change

Absolutely.

Also of interest, and related to that ^^ comment.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cwy4w6lqp4lo

Police re-opening the investigation into the crash in Wimbledon where a woman crashed her Range Rover into a school, killing 2 pupils. The driver allegedly had an epileptic seizure and claims no memory of the incident. No info on whether or not she’s still driving – claiming epilepsy means you have to stop driving immediately and notify DVLA although you can reapply for a licence if you’ve been seizure-free for one year.

Sadly it wouldn’t surprise me in the least if she claimed epilepsy, gave herself an effective 1-year driving ban and then reapplied for a licence, no criminal record, no punishment.