Can A Driver Be Too Old?

Fender benders and fatalities raise fears over elderly motorists

In Tuscola, Ill., Pearl Kamm, 77, began a road test to renew her driver's license last summer by backing the car over a curb and into a tree. Then she plowed through the plate-glass windows of the driver-testing center, killing a woman who was waiting to take a vision test and injuring three others.

As America's population grows older, such highway horror stories are becoming more common. Currently 12% of the population is 65 or older, a figure expected to reach 17% in the next 40 years. While dangerous drivers come in all ages -- the most menacing, in fact, are...

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