A bill that aims to reduce the risk of brain injury by banning tackle football for children under 12 has cleared its first hurdle in California.
The Daily Mail and Associated Press report that a legislative committee voted for the measure to be considered by the state Assembly, during a public hearing to advance the bill authored by Democratic Assembly member Kevin McCarty.
Similar attempts to ban tackle football among children and young people have been made in California previously, as well as in the states of New York and Illinois, but so far none have been successful.
California law already bans full-contact practices for high school and youth football teams during offseason and places restrictions on the number of practices permitted per week during preseason and regular season. A law introduced in 2021 also requires youth football officials to complete additional training and education in concussion and head injury.
Research has shown that repetitive head impacts during football games can cause chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), the death of nerve cells in the brain. The risk is thought to increase the longer the sport is played by an individual.
Evidence has linked the onset of CTE with the number and strength of head impacts athletes received over their career. Its early onset was also demonstrated through a study of 152 young athletes exposed to repetitive head impacts aged under age 30 at the time of death – 41.4 per cent of whom had neuropathological evidence of CTE.
At the end of last year, the first case of stage two CTE was diagnosed in former American Football player, Wyatt Bramwell, who died in July 2019 aged only 18.
Research links Wyatt’s CTE to his background in playing contact football from age eight to age 18, including four years of high school in which he played both wide receiver and cornerback.
Chris Nowinski, CEO of the Concussion Legacy Foundation and former Harvard football player and WWE professional wrestler, said: ‘I don’t have a problem with NFL players, who are adults and understand the risk and are compensated, risking CTE.
“I can’t imagine a world in which we have children, who don’t understand the risk, doing this for fun (and) taking the same risk with their brain.”
Coaches in the state have opposed the bill, according to reports, warning that it could prevent young people from accessing a vital form of physical activity.
The bill must now clear the state Assembly by the end of January to have a chance of being introduced into state law this year.
