The death of an Alabama teenager at a high school football game has brought new scrutiny to the safety of participants in the the US’s favorite sport on campuses.
Caden Tellier, 16, died in hospital after suffering a “severe” brain injury during Friday night’s game between John T Morgan academy and visiting Southern academy in Selma.
Tellier is at least the fourth fatality among high school football players in recent weeks, following the deaths of three others in connection with medical emergencies – including heat exhaustion – in Alabama, Kansas and Virginia.
The headmaster of Morgan academy, a religious private school for which Tellier was playing quarterback, said its community was heartbroken over the teenager’s death.
“It is with a heavy heart that I must inform you that Caden Tellier has gone to be with his Lord and Savior. Caden loved the Lord with all his heart and was a shining light every day he graced the halls of Morgan Academy. He was a student, a friend, an athlete and most important a Christ follower,” Bryan Oliver said in a statement, reported by WSFA TV.
“There are no words to describe how we feel as a school community and family. Caden will never be forgotten for who he was and what he means to Morgan Academy.”
Tellier’s parents issued their own statement. “Our boy, Caden Tellier, has met Jesus face to face. Everyone who knows Caden has known kindness, generosity and love, and true to his nature, he is giving of himself one more time,” it said.
Authorities in Alabama said Tellier was injured during the school’s season-opening game and taken in critical condition to hospital, where he died. No further details were available on Monday about what caused the injury.
Tellier’s death came the same day as the Guardian published an article authored by two experts in youth participation in sport questioning if high school and college football was safe – or “morally tenable”.
“The brutal fact [is] that every time we watch football, we are actually witnessing players suffer life-altering head trauma – harm that is essentially invisible to us for it occurs inside the helmet and skull,” said professors Nathan Kalman-Lamb of the University of New Brunswick and Derek Silva of King’s University College.
“We know that every 2.6 years of participation in football doubles the chances of CTE (chronic traumatic encephalopathy), which means even children and high school players are systematically suffering potentially life-changing damage on the gridiron, a reality we might reasonably characterize as a form of child abuse.
“As the globe continues to heat, conditions on the football practice field continue to worsen, and kids are left to die, we are left with a simple and straightforward question: is this sport morally sustainable?”
The professors are co-authors of The End of College Football: On the Human Cost of an All-American Game, which will be published in December.
Excessive heat was blamed as at least a contributory factor in the deaths of three other teenage players following medical emergencies this month.
Ovet Gomez-Regalado, 15, collapsed during a practice session at Shawnee Mission Northwest high school, Kansas, on 14 August, and died two days later in hospital.
His death followed those of Semaj Wilkins, 14, in New Brockton, Alabama, on 13 August; and Javion Taylor, 15, in Hopewell, Virginia, eight days earlier.