The Legal Battle over Concussions Finally Hits High School Football
The devastating effects of concussions in football players has received national attention since lawsuits against the NFL began. Unfortunately, very little attention has been paid to the dangers of high school sports, even though high school athletes are more likely to suffer concussions than older athletes, and are at greater risk for debilitating consequences and death from their injuries. That may be about to change.
During the last week of December, 2013, Alvin Jobe, the father of a Mississippi high school football player, filed a class-action lawsuit against the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) and the National Federation of High Schools (NFHS). The suit was filed on behalf of his son Grayson, an 11th-grade football player at Central Holmes Christian School in Lexington, Mississippi, and seeks to represent all current high school football players.
Jobe alleges that the organizations failed to protect his son and other players from the dangers of concussions. He wants the NCAA and NFHS to provide high schools with concussion risk information and standard of care practices, and for high schools to have concussion management plans that the organizations must certify in order for the schools to retain membership in the state organizations which make up the NFHS and for high school players to be eligible to play in the NCAA. He also wants the concussion management plans to include insurance coverage for uninsured football players.
According to a study by the National Academy of Sciences, released in October 2013, more than 250,000 youth athletes suffered concussions in 2009. As of January 1, 2014, Mississippi is the only state which does not have a youth sports concussion law.
