I am finding a disturbing trend in the media to play along with the notion that the cause of Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE) is not known yet.
This is simply not true. We have known in the scientific community since 1928 that hits are the cause.
From 1928 until Dr. Omalu’s pathological proof of its occurrence in pro football players, there were few who questioned the cause. It was not until football was proven (pathology is the gold standard in the legal arena) without a doubt via brain autopsy did the “experts” come out of the woodwork to deny its cause.
While due to decades of willful blindness, we do not know all of the factors regarding CTE such as possible contributing factors like genetics, or environment, or lifestyle, the cause remains clear.
Most important is we don’t know the prevalence. While many football industry protectors cite this unknown, it is more of an argument to stop youth football than to keep exposing kids to a known mechanism of injury that causes brain damage to find out “how many” will get this disease and die.
CTE is an overuse injury to football like Tommy John is to baseball.
There are a few differences worth noting. Heavy helmets never made for children actually increase the risk of brain damage and disease on top of the unlimited hits, some positions take hits on every play.
See award winning investigative reporter Karen Hensel’s report in 2014 on a lack of youth football helmet standards.
We know weight exponentially increases the risk just as a matter of physics. Look at car crash studies on the whiplash mathematical equation that explains how axonal damage occurs. Adding 5 lbs to this equation lowers the threshold of force necessary to cause damage. Our axons can only stretch to double their length before destroying them.
With young children’s heads (especially before puberty) being 75% of its total adult size, and neck and chest walls not being developed, each hit is like a blindside. The combo of this and the weight create a cascade of factors to substantially increase the occurrence of brain damage and disease.
Like smoking, the younger you start and the longer you play, the more likely you are to not just have brain damage but for disease to manifest. It is not just CTE, but like smoking, a spectrum of neuro degenerative diseases such Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, ALS, dementia and CTE.
Another huge difference for CTE and Tommy John is that there is no cure, no surgery and no treatment.
In effect CTE robs you of your God given intellect, sanity and eventually, your life. One too many pitches in baseball has surgery and physical therapy as a consequence.
There have been 8 known high school athletes who have been found via brain autopsy to have CTE: Eric Pelly, Nathan Stiles, Mike Jenkins, Joseph Chernach, Tyler Cornell, Paul Bright Jr (my son), Zach Easter and 1 anonymous player. 8 out of 28 brains so far.
A class action lawsuit against Pop Warner and self appointed helmet regulators NOCSAE for brain damage caused by unlimited hits in helmets never made for kids(they admit this fact by the way) was filed last September in California federal court.
There is currently more federal regulation and oversight of a child’s NFL uniform Halloween costume(age appropriateness, small parts, lead paint and flammability), then the helmets children wear to play. There is no federal oversight at all.
So kids as young as 5 get out of their car seats in California and strap on a helmet never made for them that is only a few ounces less than what a 300 lb lineman wears in the NFL, made of a cheaper ABS plastics(adult model is polycarbon) and hit each other without hit counts or limits like Little League has for pitches(hits are greater than motion). Why would a parent have their child take more hits to their head and body(100–500 per season), than they would allow their cell phone to sustain?
So parents are seeing past the lies put out by the industry that we don’t know the cause because even without understanding the fraud of covering up the science, or the lack of a helmet for kids that doesn’t increase the risk, it’s common sense your child only has one brain, who would risk that for a game?
About the author: Kimberly Archie is the nation’s leading expert on child maltreatment in sports. She has been a legal consultant and expert in more than 50 lawsuits involving athletes in sports from kids to the pros. Her legal strategies and research have been used in landmark cases such as the NFL brain injury litigation and US Soccer case that removed headers for kids 10 and under. For more information on CTE visit http://www.facesofCTE.com
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This article originally appeared on Medium
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