NFL: player health and safety

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  • August 26, 2026 at 3:15 pm #165592
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    from The Athletic’s NFL Newsletter: https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/tag/nfl-newsletter/?source=athletic_scoopcity_newsletter&campaign=19516925&userId=603890

    Alarming CTE rate

    How prevalent is CTE among former NFL players?

    Yesterday, a medical journal shared the results of a study that found “at minimum, nearly a quarter of all former NFL players who died during 2016-21 had CTE neuropathology at death.”

    That was the conclusion. And the minimum. I read the study, finding it more alarming than the conclusion implies. Here are some numbers:

    1,712 former NFL players died from 2008 to 2021.

    About 20 percent of those players’ brains were studied. Of those 338, CTE was diagnosed in 315.

    Yes, 93.2 percent of those studied brain donors had CTE.
    It’s difficult to overstate how concerning that is.

    To be sure, there are important caveats. For example, families of an individual who suffered symptoms of CTE were more likely to donate, and the donors’ mean age at death was 66.5. So most of the study was based on players who hadn’t played in decades; in the meantime, the NFL’s rules, equipment and approach have been changing significantly.

    After years spent downplaying the problem, the NFL’s made changes like new kickoff rules and allowing Guardian Caps to cover helmets.

    While concussion risks seem to now be trending in the right direction, it’ll be decades before we understand the impact these changes had, since CTE can only be definitively diagnosed after death.

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