NFL Study Reveals High Prevalence of CTE in Former NFL Players Between 2016 and 2021
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At least one in four former NFL players who died between 2016 and 2021 was found to have had chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), according to a study released on Tuesday.
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NBC NewsAt least one in four former NFL players who died between 2016 and 2021 was found to have had chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), according to a study released on Tuesday.
BreitbartThe numbers fell to “at least 25 percent” only after factoring in the number of players who did not donate their brains. The estimated numbers researchers gave for the prevalence of CTE among all ex-NFL players who passed away between 2016 and 2021 were between 24.5% and 97.7%.
NPR NewsA new study from researchers at Mass General Brigham, published Tuesday in the prominent medical journal The BMJ, seeks to establish a more accurate baseline of CTE prevalence among retired NFL players who have died. Of football players who appeared in at least one NFL game in their careers and who died between 2016 and 2021, the study found that a minimum of around 25% had CTE upon their death.
ABC News"Community brain bank studies have shown that CTE affects less than 1% of the general population. To find that somewhere between 24.5% and 97.7% of NFL players from that time period had this progressive brain disease is a wake-up call for the NFL and scientific communities," the study's lead author Dr. Daniel Daneshvar said in a statement.
VoxOne major question over the past 20 years has been: Exactly how often does playing football lead to CTE? What are the risks for peewee players versus pros? How quickly does the brain deteriorate once the disease takes hold? And new research, published this week in the British Medical Journal, has provided us with some staggering answers. After analyzing the death records for hundreds of former NFL players, the co-authors concluded that at least 25 percent of the former players who died between 2016 and 2021 had CTE at the time of their death.
New York Times5 Takeaways on the Fallout From an Alarming C.T.E. Study At least one in four N.F.L. players, and likely a much higher percentage, had the brain disease when they died. Will anything change?
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An NFL spokesperson said: “The NFL continuously strives to make the game of football safer, including by implementing strategies to reduce concussions and head impacts.
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The Guardian USAn NFL spokesperson said: “The NFL continuously strives to make the game of football safer, including by implementing strategies to reduce concussions and head impacts.
NPR NewsIn a statement to NPR, an NFL spokesperson said the league "continuously strives to make the game of football safer, including by implementing strategies to reduce concussions and head impacts."
BreitbartAn NFL spokesperson told CBS News the league “continuously strives to make the game of football safer, including by implementing strategies to reduce concussions and head impacts.”
ABC NewsIn a statement to ESPN, the NFL said it "continuously strives to make the game of football safer, including by implementing strategies to reduce concussions and head impacts."
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“The NFL remains committed to ensuring that the NFL community has access to a robust — and expanding — set of resources to enhance their physical and mental well-being. We encourage former players to utilize these resources to identify and seek treatment when they are concerned about their health.”
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NPR News"The NFL remains committed to ensuring that the NFL community has access to a robust — and expanding — set of resources to enhance their physical and mental wellbeing. We encourage former players to utilize these resources to identify and seek treatment when they are concerned about their health," the statement continued.
ABC NewsThe statement went on, "The NFL remains committed to ensuring that the NFL community has access to a robust -- and expanding -- set of resources to enhance their physical and mental well-being."
The Guardian US“The NFL remains committed to ensuring that the NFL community has access to a robust - and expanding - set of resources to enhance their physical and mental well being.
NBC News“The NFL remains committed to ensuring that the NFL community has access to a robust — and expanding — set of resources to enhance their physical and mental well being.
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The study’s lead author Daniel Daneshvar, the chair of physical medicine and rehabilitation at Mass General Brigham and an associate professor at Harvard Medical School, said that repeated traumatic brain injuries are a known factor in elevated rates of neurodegenerative disease.
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NBC NewsThe study’s lead author Daniel Daneshvar, the chair of physical medicine and rehabilitation at Mass General Brigham and an associate professor at Harvard Medical School, said that repeated traumatic brain injuries are a known factor in elevated rates of neurodegenerative disease.
NPR News"We've known that this disease process can be caused by, in part, repeated traumatic brain injury. But we didn't know how common it was," said Dr. Daniel Daneshvar, the study's lead author.
9 details only one outlet reported
Independent claims that didn't surface elsewhere in our corpus. Treat as supplementary — not corroborated across outlets.
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01 USA Today Dan Lanning made waves this week after voicing his disapproval of NFL players returning to the college level. After the NCAA passed the "five-for-five" eligibility rule, giving players five seasons of eligibility, many players who began their collegiate careers in 2022 have filed lawsuits to capitalize on the new ruling.
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02 The Hill What is CTE, and how many former NFL players have been diagnosed with it? So far, the degenerative brain disease has only been diagnosed after a person's death.
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03 ABC News Researchers noted that many cases of dementia were not captured on death certificates, suggesting the burden of neurodegenerative disease among former players may be underestimated.
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04 Breitbart The study was conducted by Mass General Brigham, Boston University, and the Concussion & CTE Foundation, and was published in The British Medical Journal.
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05 New York Times How Do You Feel About the Risks of Youth Football? A new study shows that N.F.L. players have a high risk for developing degenerative brain disease. Does anyone in your family play football? We want to know your thoughts.
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06 The Guardian US “Similarly, we and others have shown that in NFL players, specifically, there is about a four times higher rate of death from neurodegenerative disease than the general population,” he added.
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07 NBC News “Similarly, we and others have shown that in NFL players, specifically, there is about a four times higher rate of death from neurodegenerative disease than the general population,” he added.
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08 NPR News That means that further research is needed to best help the thousands of current and former NFL players who are still living, said Rachel Grashow, a neuroepidemiologist at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health who was not involved in the study.
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09 Vox When the NFL season kicks off next month, millions of Americans will gather around their televisions to watch athletes of comic book proportions crash into each other at breathtaking speeds. Inevitably, those players’ heads will smash into each other, leaving them dazed on the field. And according to a major new study, these repeated head-on collisions may eventually lead to a degenerative brain disease for many — if not most — of the players long after they’ve left the field.
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