NFL and Concussions Essay

America is a nation of football lovers. Over the past few decades, the increasingly football-crazed American population has seen the growth of the football industry from a backstreet sporting event to a multibillion-dollar business. Many professional sports leagues have sprouted and have almost been instantly garnering millions of supporters. No other spot can parallel the success of the football sport in America today. The promising future exhibited by the football industry has seen several entrepreneurs invest in it and every time, America has always made it to the top of world football events, always earning hard sought medals. Despite the fact that football is a favorite game, it has some several shortcomings, one of them being that it is violent. Perhaps this is one of the reasons why it attracts millions of fans who always want to see a showdown between one team and another. Fans are always seeking for hits and will express disappointment in case their team loses. According to a famous sports columnist Mr. Lipstyte who writes for the popular online news column USA today, the main reason why the game attracts a lot of people is because it has a pattern of violence.This culture is usually very pronounced in the college tournaments and also at the professional level of the sport (Robert, 2012). Football has been a very popular sport for a very long time, well into a century now. However, for the past two decades, it is becoming apparent that the violence of the sport is beginning to take a toll on the health of its players. The popularity of this sport is at stake, as more people are increasingly becoming aware of its correlation with brain injuries referred to as concussions. According to Mayo Clinic, concussions can be defined as traumatic brain injuries that affect the correct functioning of the brain. Symptoms normally range from mild to severe. Concussions can cause temporary or permanent effects on the functioning of the brain, depending on the severity of the injury.

Is your time best spent reading someone else’s essay? Get a 100% original essay FROM A CERTIFIED WRITER!

Save 25%

The brain is a very delicate organ. Recent advances in technology have enabled scientists to understand the intricacies of the human brain. Though much about the human brain is still shrouded in mystery, sophisticated technologies have been used to explore the amazingly delicate fabrics of the brain. Science has made huge leaps towards the understanding the effects trauma has on the functioning of the brain. More attention has been focused on the head trauma generated by concussions. Research has continued to reveal that the effects of concussions on the brain are more pronounced and severe than initially thought. Extensive and exhaustive studies have shown the fact that even the slightest of concussions can result in some of the most disastrous brain damages (Didehbanie et al. 2013). Football is a spot of rigor. As seen, concussions are traumatic brain injuries usually caused by a blow to the head. Very slight concussions may result from vigorously shaking the body or the head, something professional footballers have mastered to thrill the fans. The National Football League comprises of 32 professional football teams. More attention has been focused on these teams as with regards to the statistics of concussions among its footballers.

NFL is notorious for encouraging its players to engage in a little rough play (Tyler & Nelson, 2000). As a result, there has been an ever-growing criticism leveled against NFL's rough sports and tactics. This growing amount of criticism is what has been responsible for tainting the image of NFL. It has come under fire from all sides including from medical bodies which advise against the effect of being rough in the sports. The severity of the effects of a concussion can only be reduced if the NFL took solid action to end rough play. It must encourage its players to engage in safe play. There have also been suggestions that the sport should have headgear to protect against minor and major blows to the head. This paper is going to focus on the scientific research that has been done to uncover the real and unforeseen dangers that result for minor and major repeated concussion on the players. The scientific research will then be used to recommend a drastic change in the way NFL. Through the eye-opening research was done in this paper, the often-debilitating consequences NFL players face in the long term due to continuous concussions will be made plain. The paper will also highlight systematic rough play culture made bolder by bogus policies in the NFL and how it has impacted on the professional football players. This paper will also highlight the media campaign against the NFL aimed at forcing it to protect the mental health of its players in future. Finally, the paper will seek to show how the negative media publicity about NFL and concussions will have on its long-term performance. The popularity of the NFL league will surely drop would these sports organizations fail to heed the expert advice on how to protect its players against head injuries.

An understanding that concussion has real and proven dangers on the mental health is very paramount and urgent for the NFL players and the football fans. It is really important to make plain the fact that concussion is not to be taken lightly as they can have life-altering and life-threatening consequences. The fact that the rates of players experiencing mild and chronic mental illnesses is on the rise means that something has to be done urgently (Casson, 2010). According to a 2009 research done on a random sample of 1063 NFL former players and retirees, it was discovered that the chances of an NFL player having a mental illness are several times that of the average American. The Institute of Social Research, credited for this research pointed out some very common illnesses among the NFL retirees. These mental illnesses include the Alzheimer's Disease and dementia. There were also several mild memory-related illnesses documented among these ex-players. The chances of these mental illnesses affecting a 49-year old NFL retiree were found to be 19 times higher than those of the average American at the same age. Even more shocking was the discovery that at over the age of 50, NFL players are three times more likely to be mentally handicapped as compared to the rest of the American population at the same age (Institute for Social Research, 2009). There are also current brain studies dealing with neurology that continue to give shocking statistics about the effects of concussions on NFL players. For example, in July 2017, a study conducted by the Boston University School of Medicine revealed that out of the 35 NFL players the research was done on, 34 of them had chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE (Drysdale, 2013). Keeping in mind that this study was post-mortem research, a red flag can be raised that most NFL players are succumbing to mental illnesses caused by prolonged and repeated concussions in the course of their career. These findings make plain just how professional football players at NFL are giving away their future to mental illnesses every time they engage in a football game. The studies can also be instrumental in helping to highlight the detrimental effect football can have on the health of the general society.

NFL football players have been suffering silently from mental illnesses. Some of them are entirely mentally disabled at very young ages and have had to fully rely on their family's and good Samaritans for support. A great number of them are also battling depression, and there has been a rise of attempted suicide cases among the former NFL employees. One among hundreds of NFL players who have been struggling with depression for a while is Lauvale Sape, who is a former NFL defence lineman. Sape suffers from PSTD a very unlikely disease stemming from the so much popular NFL games. He sustained multiple concussions while playing and has ever since he retired, been fighting with the urge to commit suicide. He has already attempted several suicides. Another player, George Koonce, a former NFL linebacker, has silently been struggling with PTSD. He has also already attempted suicide. Statistics point out that more than 10 NFL players committed suicide between 2011 and 2014. Also, a former Super Bowl champion Jim MacMahon has since been suffering with dementia since he exited the NFL. He has already experienced the crippling effects of the disease such as losing the use of his fingers and experiencing coordination issues. These are just a few players among hundreds and possibly thousands of them nursing the effects of concussions. The question has always been asked, "Is there really life after NFL?" Why does this spots body gamble with the future of its players? Is it because of the profitability of the sports business they are running? This, if true, is ethically unacceptable. The NFL should begin taking charge of the future mental health of its employees. One outspoken critic of the NFL has continued to write widely concerning the dangers NFL exposes to its employees. It is worth noting that some of his publications that indicate the risks of everyday concussions on NFL players have been published even by NFL media outlets. This means that NFL is becoming aware of the criticism and the real dangers it is exposing to the players. At this point, with all the scientific expositions showing the effect of concussions on brain health, NFL must be feeling guilty of exposing its players to mental illnesses, right? Wrong. NFL has very loose policies that encourage brutal and rough play. These are the very tactics that promote concussions.

As the public becomes more and more aware of the effects of concussions on mental health, the NFL is likely to experience a drop in revenue. People would undoubtedly begin to stop entertaining a sport which leads to mental illnesses. Recent studies have shown that parents who have been informed about the debilitating effects of NFL concussions on future life have publicly expressed their concerns about allowing their children to play professional football. According to a recent poll conducted by the news outlet NBC News, nearly half the parents interviewed said they don't allow their children to play football due to a concussion. The number of parents and general public saying no to the football profession has been increasing over the years, according to statistics given by the NBC News (Murray,2018). This shows that the public is slowly becoming aware of the dangers football pose on mental health. Parents interviewed expressed a wish that they would want their children to try sports other than football.

Conclusion

The only way to ensure the survival of the NFL would be for it to implement drastic policies to protect players from concussions. The three-point stance used by linemen for defense in NFL games is one of the hotspots of concussions. This stance involves the lineman sprinting and colliding with the incoming opponent. A football columnist, Mr. Robert Lipstyle recommends that this tactic should be banned entirely in the NFL (Robert, 2012). Another recommendation would be the introduction of compulsory head injury courses for coaches. Better helmets should be worn at all times (Drysdale, 2013). The NFL has to pass and implement all of these recommendations to avoid future mental injury hazards posed by football. The benefit of enacting these recommendations is that football will become a safer game while at the same time keeping the fans entertained. There have been revelations that the National Operating Committee on Standards for Athletic Equipment which satisfies helmets receives part of its funding from some of the companies that manufacture the helmets. This should stop as there are chances that this body could be certifying defective helmets for financial gain from the companies that make the helmets. The fight...