Can $100M Prevent Brain Damage In NFL Athletes?
This week, the NFL announced a new $100 million initiative to prevent injuries on the field. Concussions are a big problem in football, and more and more players are getting diagnosed with chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). Will Smith even starred in Concussion, which documented it. Now critics are wondering if the new plan will be enough, and fans are asking if these changes will spoil the game.
The Play Smart, Play Safe initiative, announced this week by NFL commissioner Roger Goodell, is a $100M commitment to fund engineering and medical research to prevent brain injuries. This comes on the heels of the 42 rules changes already implemented since 2002, aimed at minimizing injury to players.
$60M will go to new developments in helmet and field technology. We know wide receivers and offensive lineman get injured in different ways, so their protection should be different too. The NFL said they hope within 3–5 years to design their next-generation of helmets that will now be unique for each position. Vicis test helmets are one example of what that might look like.
But ideas for protection can go further than just helmets and pads. The NFL also announced that it’s developing a special layer under artificial turf that can absorb more of the blow from a fall.
The other $40M will go to new medical research like studies on the long-term effects of concussion, CTE rates, and treatments. For a start, the NFL is already partnered with Quanterix, with the hopes to create a simple blood test to diagnose concussions on the field. They’re also conducting studies on adolescents, to see if they can identify brain damage early on.
CTE is a big threat for all football players. It could develop in anyone after repeated hits to the head, when proteins from the brain break off and collect. The proteins cut-off blood flow to the brain, causing it to shrink. As you can imagine CTE is traumatic, and often deadly, for players and their families.
By his sophomore year of college, Michael Keck had already developed CTE from playing high school and college football. He’d lose his memory, couldn’t focus, and became emotionally unstable. He’d had two severe grade 3 concussions in his freshman year, and when he tried to come play the next year, he got agonizing headaches and temporarily lost his vision. He was so scared he had to stop playing. At the age of 25, Keck died and was diagnosed with CTE.
Originally, doctors thought only boxers got CTE, but now we know football and hockey players are just as much at risk. As of September 2015, 95% of the former NFL players analyzed had evidence of CTE. Unfortunately, there’s no current way to diagnose CTE until the autopsy after a player has died. That’s probably why it’s gone so long without being identified.
Despite these rule changes and the $100M commitment, critics say the NFL isn’t doing enough to prevent CTE, and some fans say they’ve done too much. The season’s only started, and reports are already coming in about missed hits and failures in the new concussion protocol. But it’s more than the NFL’s rules to blame; players, teammates, and coaches are responsible too. It’s also going to be a tough adjustment for fans, who won’t get to see the truck stick anymore as the league prioritizes player safety over the big hits. Don’t be surprised that some old-school fans are pretty upset about the rule changes.
Only time will tell if the new initiatives will be enough. CTE is a real concern for football players and the future of the sport. While the NFL is attempting to solve this problem, it’s going to take changes on all fronts to make a difference.
