September 26, 2024
I’ve been a diehard football fan my whole life — New England Patriots on Sundays and NC State every Saturday — but no matter how excited I get for the season, there’s one thing that’s become tragically predictable: concussions.
Football isn’t just about touchdowns and trophies — it’s about head trauma, brain damage and lives forever altered. NFL legend BrettBrett -98.1% Favre’s recent diagnosis with Parkinson’s disease is a reminder of the severe risks players face. Concussions have been linked to Parkinson’s, and Favre has said he is aware of three or four diagnosed concussions he suffered during his 20-year NFL career, but said he thinks he sustained “hundreds, maybe thousands.” One concussion can raise the risk of Parkinson’s by 57% and dementia by 72%, according to a 2020 study of 47,483 individuals who had been diagnosed with a concussion. And it gets worse with repeated blows to the head.
“Head trauma has been known to be a risk factor for Parkinson’s disease for a long time,” said Gary Miller, vice dean of research strategy and innovation at the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health, whose research focuses on the non-genetic causes of Parkinson’s. “We don’t know how Brett Favre got Parkinson’s, or what his genetics are, but it’s highly likely that his head trauma from his playing days was a major contributor.”
A staggering 91.7% of former NFL players studied by Boston University’s CTE Center had chronic traumatic encephalopathy, a brain condition directly linked to repeated head impacts. To date, the NFL has paid more than $1.2 billion in settlements to players suffering from brain-related diseases, but that doesn’t stop the hits — or the toll they take.
The day after Favre made his announcement, former Minnesota Vikings quarterback Tommy Kramer, who’s 69 years old, revealed on X that he was diagnosed with dementia last year. In an interview in June, Kramer said doctors at the Cleveland Clinic told him he had suffered 14 concussions. “I know for sure it was more than what they said,” he added. “I said, ‘I can tell you right now, double that.'”
Recent games serve as somber reminders of the dangers associated with the game. For example, in the week three match-up between the Philadelphia Eagles and New Orleans Saints, two Eagles players entered concussion protocol — one who was vomiting on the field following his concussion and the other who lay motionless, unconscious after a violent (and late) hit from a New Orleans Saints player. And then there’s Miami Dolphins quarterback Tua Tagovailoa, who at the age of 26 years has already suffered at least three concussions in just four NFL seasons. Favre’s diagnosis is a grim warning for Tagovailoa and every other NFL player.
This crisis isn’t limited to the NFL. A 2023 study in JAMA Neurology found that 41% of athletes under 30 exposed to repeated head injuries had CTE, with many having died by suicide. With 5.6 million people playing tackle football in the U.S. in 2023, this issue stretches across all levels of the game.
Miller said he’s concerned that unlike college or professional sports, middle-school and high-school teams rarely have trained medics at games and practices. “In professional football,” he said, “having their players get concussions hurts their bottom line. They can lose millions of dollars by losing that top player, so they’re incentivized to protect them. In high school, that’s not the case.”
Parents may know that football increases the risk of concussions, but Favre’s diagnosis shows that the danger extends far beyond game day — these injuries can lead to a lifetime of neurological issues, including Parkinson’s, dementia and CTE.
Football has always been a critical part of youth development, and no one is shutting down the NFL. Loving the game and wanting it to be safer aren’t mutually exclusive. It’s not about abandoning football; it’s about making the game safer for everyone, from youth leagues to the pros.
After Tagovailoa’s most recent concussion, many players, coaches and pundits have voiced their belief that he should retire to preserve his post-football life and health. While concerns for individual athletes are valid, focusing solely on one player distracts from the broader issue: the urgent need for systemic and structural changes in the sport. These solutions are complex, but they are essential if football is to evolve without putting players’ health at continued risk.
Innovations like Guardian Caps have shown significant concussion reduction among those players who wear them, according to NFL Chief Medical Officer Dr. Allen Sills, but only a handful of players are wearing them in games. Other advances in helmet technology, such as smart helmets with impact sensors, could further reduce head injuries, but their high cost could limit their adoption in youth football.
Helmet technology is just one part of the solution, though. Limiting full-contact practices, improving sideline protocols and delaying full-contact play until later ages could play a crucial role in reducing long-term brain damage.
From NFL legends like Brett Favre to young athletes just starting out, the risks are real, and the cost is devastating. But it doesn’t have to be this way. Football can remain the sport Americans love, but it must evolve. We owe it to the players, from pee wee leagues to the pros, to make sure that playing the game doesn’t come with the inevitable cost of a damaged brain. This isn’t about giving up on football — it’s about fighting for a safer future for everyone who plays.