alt Hacker NewsSame here. When did Boston University start publishing about the CTE/football connection? 10 or 15 years ago? A couple I know, one with a public health degree from an Ivy, still let one of her kids play through all of that, and he played at the college level, too.
At the same time, a lot of parents (myself included) steered kids to other sports. That had another effect: there was even more pressure on parents who didn't care about CTE (and their kids) to get into football because kiddie leagues and especially high school teams were short of players. This happened to a friend whose two boys were strong hockey players, the coach at their school pushed them to try out for football the following season.
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> Same here. When did Boston University start publishing about the CTE/football connection? 10 or 15 years ago?
Our science writers at BU have been writing about CTE research for at least that long. Oldest I could find was 2010. We've published a lot on the topic on our main news site and our science publication:
Brink CTE stories: https://www.bu.edu/brink/tag/cte/
BU Today CTE stories going back to 2010: https://www.bu.edu/today/tag/cte/
Some favorites:
This 5 part series: https://www.bu.edu/brink/series/cte-how-bu-is-changing-the-g...
This story about Youth Football: https://www.bu.edu/articles/2018/youth-football-linked-to-ea...
And this video from the Director of the CTE research center talking about how these discoveries impacted her as a huge football fan: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yUsDvKyhtA4
I'm a creative director @ BU and our designers have occasionally helped our editorial teams with story designs for these types of research stories. It's been interesting watching the progression of the research over the years and as a parent as well I would not let my kids play football based on the research. There are other, less risky sports they can enjoy. Skiing, Martial Arts, etc. I don't believe we can or should protect them from all risk, but this CTE research has been a clear enough signal in how football is played for me to be wary of letting them play.
Tbf, IIUC, hockey's not much better. Same issue: high speed collisions in padding that makes high speed collisions seem less damaging than they actually are. Boxing, too. Most field sports aren't much better.
Lift weights and play tennis or baseball.