Fitness to drive
Update of Annex III of Directive 91/439/EEC: reports of the medical working groups
In 2002 the expert members of the Driving Licence Committee expressed the opinion that the Annex III of Directive 91/439/EEC on driving licences has to be updated. Annex III is dealing with minimum standards of physical and mental fitness for driving a power-driven vehicle and, in fact, its contents are based on decisions made more than twenty years ago. There was therefore a need to find more consistency between the legislation and the current medical knowledge.
Thus according to a request of the Driving Licence Committee in 2003, three priority items have been addressed regarding the fitness to drive: eyesight, epilepsy and diabetes. In this context three specialised medical groups of physicians representing their Member State have been set up and worked between March 2004 and June 2005. You will find below the results, conclusions and recommendations of the eyesight, epilepsy and diabetes working groups in their final reports which remain for the moment working documents.
The opinions expressed in the studies are those of the consultant and do not necessarily represent the position of the Commission.
- New standards for the visual functions of drivers (526 kB)
- Epilepsy and Driving in Europe (1,8 MB)
- Diabetes and Driving in Europe (964 kB)
Driving under the influence of alcohol, drugs and medicines
- Expert group on alcohol, drugs, medicines and driving: its members propose actions and encourage the European Commission to adopt recommendations and to bring them to a successful conclusion
- Research (6th FWP - 3rd call): DRUID, Driving Under the Influence of alcohol, Drugs and medicines
- To be launched in autumn 2006, duration 4 years, total cost of the project about 24 millions € (EC contribution, nearly 19 millions €)
- Expected outcome:
- conduct reference studies of the impact on fitness to drive for alcohol, illicit drugs and medicines and give new insights to the real degree of impairment caused by psychoactive substances and their actual impact on road safety
- generate recommendations for the definition of analytical and risk thresholds
- analyse the prevalence of alcohol and other psychoactive substances in accidents and in general driving, set up a comprehensive and efficient epidemiological database
- evaluate “good practice” for detection and training measures for road traffic police allowing a legal monitoring of drivers.
- establish an appropriate classification system of medicines affecting driving ability, give recommendations for its implementation and create a framework to position medicines according to a labelling system
- evaluate the efficiency of strategies of prevention, penalisation and rehabilitation, considering the difficulties of appropriate evaluation strategies for combined substance use and recommend “good practice”
- define strategies of driving bans, combining the road safety objectives with the individual´s need for mobility
- define the responsibility of health care professionals for patients consuming psychoactive substances and their impact on road safety, elaborate guidelines and make information available and applicable for all European countries.
