Ethics Newsline®

BOSTON
As fans went into a frenzy last week over Super Bowl XLI, another story also captured headlines: the ethical implications of subjecting young men to a sport in which concussive injury increasingly is linked to mental and physical impairments in middle age.

In a page-one story, the New York Times last week profiled Ted Johnson, who helped the New England Patriots win three Super Bowls.

Times reporter Alan Schwarz writes: “Now, [Johnson] says, he forgets people’s names, misses appointments and, because of an addiction to amphetamines, can become so terrified of the outside world that he locks himself alone inside his Boston apartment in bed with the blinds drawn for days at a time.”

“Mr. Johnson’s decline began, he said, in August 2002, with a concussion he sustained in a preseason game against the New York Giants. He sustained another four days later during a practice, after Patriots Coach Bill Belichick went against the recommendation of the team’s trainer, Johnson said, and submitted him to regular on-field contact,” Schwarz wrote.

Belichick declined to comment when interviewed by the Times.

The Boston Globe reports that Johnson, 34, says that while he was listed as having three or four concussions in his career, he says the real number is “closer to 30, maybe even more…. I’ve been dinged so many times I’ve lost count.”

Globe writer Jackie MacMullan reports that Johnson decided to go public with his illnesses after the recent suicide of former NFL defensive back Andre Waters, who had multiple concussions and suffered from depression.

KNBC-TV in Los Angeles reports that some researchers are warning that the dangers of repeated concussions are not limited to professional players, with high school and college athletes also at risk of future mental impairment.

According to a report from the Detroit Free Press, parents in Michigan are leading an effort to get schools to implement programs to more effectively detect and prevent concussions. According to the Free Press, some researchers argue that the “shake-it-off” attitude that sends youngsters back onto the playing field after being hit in the head is a particular danger to children because maturing brains are slower to heal.