The Latest on Football and Blows to the Head

With fall’s football season in full swing everywhere from our youth fields to the professional gridiron, it’s once again time for us to pass on to you some of the latest findings from the Concussion Legacy Foundation on the effects of exposure to repeated impacts to the head. As one who loves football, I know how easy it is to ignore what’s being learned about the effects of concussions, especially if it threatens our views on the game and even our own childrens’ involvement. The latest research has found that among a sample of one hundred and fifty two young athletes exposed to repetitive head impacts who died before the age of thirty, just over forty-one percent had neuropathological evidence of Chronic Traumatic Encephelopathy, or CTE. Included in the study was the brain of Meiko Locksley, the deceased son of University of Maryland Head football coach Michael Locksley, who is warning parents to use caution and wisdom, as his son started playing tackle football at age seven.