87 out of 91 Deceased NFL Players Test Positive for CTE

[andrew8798]

A total of 87 out of 91 former NFL players have tested positive for the brain disease at the center of the debate over concussions in football, according to new figures from the nation’s largest brain bank focused on the study of traumatic head injury.

Researchers with the Department of Veterans Affairs and Boston University have now identified the degenerative disease known as chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE, in 96 percent of NFL players that they’ve examined and in 79 percent of all football players. The disease is widely believed to stem from repetitive trauma to the head, and can lead to conditions such as memory loss, depression and dementia.

In total, the lab has found CTE in the brain tissue in 131 out of 165 individuals who, before their deaths, played football either professionally, semi-professionally, in college or in high school.

Forty percent of those who tested positive were the offensive and defensive linemen who come into contact with one another on every play of a game, according to numbers shared by the brain bank with FRONTLINE. That finding supports past research suggesting that it’s the repeat, more minor head trauma that occurs regularly in football that may pose the greatest risk to players, as opposed to just the sometimes violent collisions that cause concussions.

But the figures come with several important caveats, as testing for the disease can be an imperfect process. Brain scans have been used to identify signs of CTE in living players, but the disease can only be definitively identified posthumously. As such, many of the players who have donated their brains for testing suspected that they had the disease while still alive, leaving researchers with a skewed population to work with.

Even with those caveats, the latest numbers are “remarkably consistent” with past research from the center suggesting a link between football and long-term brain disease, said Dr. Ann McKee, the facility’s director and chief of neuropathology at the VA Boston Healthcare System.

“People think that we’re blowing this out of proportion, that this is a very rare disease and that we’re sensationalizing it,” said McKee, who runs the lab as part of a collaboration between the VA and BU. “My response is that where I sit, this is a very real disease. We have had no problem identifying it in hundreds of players.”

The NFL will no doubt try to bury this story

[fuzzywarble, squat cobbler]

Well..the players DO know the risks of what they sign up for

[Waffel113]

Sept 18, 2015 17:03:21 GMT -5 fuzzywarble, squat cobbler said:

Well..the players DO know the risks of what they sign up for

...which is no defense for the league doing absolutely jack shit to improve their concussion protocol, or even acknowledge that this is an issue. Yeah, they know what they're getting in to, but wouldn't you expect your employer to look out for your health just a wee bit better than the NFL has done over the past five-plus years?

[andrew8798]

In those who never played pro football, but played college or high school that were tested, 44 out of 74 had symptoms of CTE.

[Speedy Cerviche]

That ought to give the NFL a headache.

[Mochi Lone Wolf]

Sept 18, 2015 17:28:01 GMT -5 Waffel113 said:

Sept 18, 2015 17:03:21 GMT -5 fuzzywarble, squat cobbler said:

Well..the players DO know the risks of what they sign up for

...which is no defense for the league doing absolutely jack shit to improve their concussion protocol, or even acknowledge that this is an issue. Yeah, they know what they're getting in to, but wouldn't you expect your employer to look out for your health just a wee bit better than the NFL has done over the past five-plus years?

Seriously. It's like saying that because construction workers knew the risks to their job, they shouldn't complain if their employer makes their cranes out of f***** bubblegum.

[Deleted]

Sept 18, 2015 21:48:20 GMT -5 Mochi Lone Wolf said:

Sept 18, 2015 17:28:01 GMT -5 Waffel113 said:

...which is no defense for the league doing absolutely jack shit to improve their concussion protocol, or even acknowledge that this is an issue. Yeah, they know what they're getting in to, but wouldn't you expect your employer to look out for your health just a wee bit better than the NFL has done over the past five-plus years?

Seriously. It's like saying that because construction workers knew the risks to their job, they shouldn't complain if their employer makes their cranes out of f***** bubblegum.

Or Truck Drivers could get into an fatal accident or cops could be killed in the job. Hell just simply being in a vehicle is a huge risk since it's always in the top 10 or even the top 5 of leading causes of death.

[Push R Truth]

I'll toss this out there even though I feel dirty for defending a kabillion dollar industry:

Even though the article itself already states it, I'll repeat it: These numbers are heavily skewed. Your brain had to be donated, which for most people wouldn't happen unless there was a belief something was wrong in the first place. Sure, people randomly donate their body for science all the time, but these were primarily brains that belonged to people that had strong belief their brain was already damaged.

This isn't "omg 87 out of every 91 players had brain damage!" This is "87 out of 91 dead dudes that thought they had brain damage actually did." I wouldn't be shocked if a large portion of those brains where from the days when your helmet was a small leather cap.


Still doesn't excuse the NFL.

[Jedi-El of Tomorrow]

Sept 18, 2015 17:28:01 GMT -5 Waffel113 said:

Sept 18, 2015 17:03:21 GMT -5 fuzzywarble, squat cobbler said:

Well..the players DO know the risks of what they sign up for

...which is no defense for the league doing absolutely jack shit to improve their concussion protocol, or even acknowledge that this is an issue. Yeah, they know what they're getting in to, but wouldn't you expect your employer to look out for your health just a wee bit better than the NFL has done over the past five-plus years?

And it's not just five plus years, it's been going on for decades. The NFL buried evidence about concussions, and continually ignored that it was a huge problem.

[Red Impact]

Push R Truth is right, what this basically says is that 87 of 91 people who had symptoms of a disease all ended up having that disease. It's not quite as damning as 87 out of 91 of all players having that disease. Granted, it's still not information to ignore in light of how sleezy the NFL is, just that you can't take it to mean more beyond that.

Sept 18, 2015 17:03:21 GMT -5 fuzzywarble, squat cobbler said:

Well..the players DO know the risks of what they sign up for

No they didn't.

That's the entire point of the controversy and lawsuits, the NFL had information related to the real risk of repeated concussions and paid to hide it, or bullied journals into hiding it. Thus, the players, fans, and public at large didn't really know because the NFL made sure they didn't. And when you have league doctors and league-sponsored researchers (alliances which may not be fully disclosed) telling a player something is perfectly safe, they're not expected to have the foresight to search through hundreds of medical journals each month to find articles that may say otherwise. Meanwhile, research into concussions, safety equipment, etc was all set back for decades while the company tried to stall the information.

They knew there were risks sure, but when all mainstream medical thought is that concussions heal like any other bruise, hiding evidence that they don't literally means that they don't know the risks. It'd be akin to a lawyer for GM arguing that the company isn't responsible for faulty brake lines because people driving know the inherent risks of driving a car.

[HMARK Center]

Yeah, the article makes it clear that the numbers are skewed by the fact that the brains tested were only on those who thought ahead to donate (and thus must have known they had something wrong with them), but it's still incredibly damning.

We're really headed toward a tipping point with the NFL, and with football in general. It's still insanely popular, but the number of kids signing up for youth programs is already dropping, and this information isn't going to vanish any time soon.