How Common Is CTE in NFL Players, Really?
At least 1 in 4 former NFL players who died recently had CTE at death, and the true rate probably sits well above that. That's the finding of a new BMJ analysis covering every NFL player who died from 2008 to 2021. It corrects the famous 99% number for the fact that families donate brains when they suspect disease, and it lands on the same lever a decade of neuropathology has kept pointing to: years of tackle football, not the concussions someone remembers, drive who gets the disease. If you or someone you love plays, that's where the decision lives.