Superb Owl

I don ' t know that I have anything new to say about this but for fans of North American football -- that includes me, alas -- the sport has become a guilty pleasure.This is a good, accessible and careful resource about Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy. It can ' t be definitively diagnosed until after death, and the required examination is very laborious, so we don ' t know exactly what percentage of players are affected. But we know it ' s a lot, and we also know that the risk is strongly associated with the number of years a person plays the game.The NFL and governing associations at all levels have made rule changes in response to the concern about head injury, but they don ' t really do much. You can no longer intentionally strike a blow to the head but the damage isn ' t caused by the occasional diagnosable concussion. It ' s caused by the innumerable small head bumps that are inherent to the game. The problem can ' t be solved with helmet technology either. The helmet protects the skull and face, but it can ' t stop the brain from bouncing around inside the skull. The mechanism is unknown, but as they add up over time they start a process which may not manifest until after the player retires. So the miraculously youthful 43 year old Tom Brady, who is now completing what is probably about his 35th year of playing football, just might start showing symptoms when he ' s 50. It ' s questionable whether the sport can survive. If parents stop letting their boys play the ...
Source: Stayin' Alive - Category: American Health Source Type: blogs