An investigation into sudden athlete deaths and on-pitch collapses – UK, 2008 – 2022

Part II of a four part series on the COVID 'vaccines'

If you haven’t done so already, please read the first article in the series.

On the 12th of June 2021, Danish Premier League football player Christian Eriksen collapsed on pitch during the first half of the Euro 2020 game against Finland, having suffered cardiac arrest. The news rapidly spread on Social Media, with many speculating that the novel COVID vaccines being rolled out across the world were to blame. The following day, Giuseppe Marotta, director of Eriksen’s club, Inter Milan, stated that Eriksen had not been vaccinated at the time of the incident. However, as of the 21st of December 2021, the Premier League (UK) confirmed that the majority of its players (92%) had received one, two or three doses of a COVID vaccine. Similar rates were reported by other leagues; 98% for Serie A (Italy), 95% for Ligue 1 (France), 92% for Bundesliga (Germany) and LaLiga (Spain). Assuming the figures provided by the major leagues are correct, then it is reasonable to assume that the majority of professional athletes have as of today, received at least one dose of a given COVID vaccine. But this isn’t always the case.

In 2021, it was reported that NHL player Josh Archibald (29, US) had developed myocarditis. To this day, he remains unvaccinated. Wigan striker Charlie Wyke (28, UK) suffered cardiac arrest during training in November 2021, and was said to have been unvaccinated at the time of the incident. Amateur cricketer Josh Downie (24, UK) was reported as having died on pitch of a heart attack on the 10th of May 2021. The COVID vaccines were not available to his age group in the UK until after the 7th of June 2021.

On the 24th of August 2022, former professional football player Matt Le Tissier shared on Twitter a link to Good Sciencing; a “non-exhaustive and continuously growing list of mainly young athletes who had major medical issues in 2021/2022 after receiving one or more COVID vaccines”. The following day, he was interviewed on GB News where he called for an investigation into the matter, appearing to suggest that this phenomenon – although pre-existing – had reached epidemic proportions.

Sudden cardiac arrest and death in athletes and the young is not new. In 2006, Spurs striker Radwan Hamed (UK), then 17, suffered a heart attack during his first professional game. In March 2012, then professional footballer Fabrice Muamba (UK) collapsed 43 minutes after kick-off. His heart “stopped beating for 78 minutes”. Remarkably, he survived. In April 2012, Claire Squires (UK), a participant in the London Marathon “collapsed on the final stretch of the 26.2-mile course”. London marathon medical director Sanjay Sharma was called to the scene, expecting “to find a man in his seventies”, but was reported as having said “I had to hide my horror as I saw a young, athletic woman … I had to... compose myself for a few seconds before we started resuscitation”. Claire too, had suffered cardiac arrest, but sadly passed. A few months later, an inquest into her death concluded that “the drug DMAA, found in some nutrition supplements and not banned at the time, was in her system … The coroner said she died of cardiac failure caused by extreme exertion, complicated by DMAA toxicity”.

On the 23rd of December 2013, Jamie Skinner (13, UK) collapsed on pitch. The same day, “rising Hibs star” David Paul (18, UK) “died in his sleep”, having apparently suffered cardiac arrest. In 2020, “fit and healthy” Jack Atkinson (18, UK) “suddenly collapsed and died while playing football”.

And it’s not just athletes either; in 2014, Olivia Diamond (12, UK) died of “acute myocarditis”, after “the flu virus reached her heart causing it to inflame”. In 2016, Maria (US, 3) was “was diagnosed with Influenza A that for some reason migrated to her heart causing Myocarditis”.

What is the incidence rate?

Over the years, various studies have sought to calculate the incidence rate of this phenomenon, but the figures presented vary considerably. According to a study published in 2016, inconsistencies in the definitions of ‘athlete’ and ‘sudden cardiac death’ across studies “help account for the wide range of estimated incidence of SCD [sudden cardiac death] in athletes in prior reports, from 1 in 3,000 up to 1 in 1 million”. A literature review published in 2014 stated that “studies with higher methodological quality consistently yielded incidence rates in the range of 1:40,000 to 1:80,000” and that “some athlete subgroups, specifically men, African-American/black athletes and basketball players, appear to be at higher risk”.

In 2006, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in Lausanne, Switzerland, published a study where they compiled reports from international data banks for the period 1966 to 2004. They found 1,101 sudden deaths in athletes under the age of 35; 29 a year on average. The sports with the highest incidence rate were football (30%), basketball (25%) and running (15%). 90% of incidents were cardiovascular in nature.

In 2009, a study focusing on sudden death in US athletes for the period 1980 - 2006 identified 1,866 deaths across thirty-eight disciplines for athletes age 13 - 25. The study also noted that reports were less common in the period 1980 to 1993 (576 incidents) than 1994 to 2006 (1290 incidents) and increased at a rate of 6% per year. Another study published in 2012 estimated 100 to 150 deaths during competitive sports in the United States annually.

In December 2020, the FIFA Sudden Death Registry was published. The study focused exclusively on football and included individuals from all over the world, age groups, and proficiencies. The authors of the study found that from 2014 to 2018, there were 617 incidents, 475 of which were fatalities.

In 2018, The Guardian published a story headlined ‘More young footballers dying of heart-problems than thought’. The article referenced a study published by professor Sanjay Sharma of St George’s University (and chair of the expert cardiac committee of the Football Association), where they found a death rate of 1:14,700, which according to Sharma, was “considerably higher than the previous estimates of one in 50,000 or one in 200,000”. Sharma is quoted as having said that the results were “threefold greater than any study has ever reported in the past and that did surprise us … what surprised us the most was that of the eight deaths that did occur, six had completely normal screens at the age of 16. That was worrying”.

For the most part, these studies appear to source their data from various international data banks as opposed to news reports. Good Sciencing, which, judging by the number and frequency of shares on Twitter, appears to have become a ‘source of truth’ for many with regards to the incidence rate of this phenomenon since 2021, bases its figures entirely on the latter. Their research suggests that the phenomenon has grown exponentially since the rollout of the COVID vaccines.

The purpose of our research was to investigate how the reporting rate for these incidents has evolved relative to the pre-COVID era. The term ‘reporting rate’ used throughout this article is referring purely to the number of reports published in the press, as opposed to actual incidents, which would require access to the aforementioned data banks and would involve a different methodology than that employed by Good Sciencing.

Methodology

News reports were searched for using both Google and DuckDuckGo. Search terms used included “footballer suddenly dies”, “footballer heart attack”, “footballer sudden death”, “sudden death”, “suddenly dies”, “athlete sudden death”, “athlete sudden heart attack”, “rugby sudden death”, “rugby heart attack” and “collapse pitch”.

The stories were logged in a Google spreadsheet that is available here. Given resource constraints, scope was limited to incidents that concerned UK residents (England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland) for the period 2008 – 2022. Criteria for inclusion was that the individual in question had to be involved in some form of sport activity. This was usually mentioned either in the article title or body. Retired professionals were also logged. The reported cause of the incident, whether or not it resulted in a fatality, and whether the individual was partaking in their sport at the time of the incident were all logged. Any incidents where death or injury was linked to suicide, drug use, a pre-existing condition, or some form of physical trauma were not included. More often than not, the reports did not confirm the exact cause of the incident, in which case, the incident cause was marked as ‘Unconfirmed’.

Only ‘official’ news reports were included. Good Sciencing included a report from an individual sharing their story on Twitter. These were not included, as the same would need to be done for every year in order to compare like for like.

For 2021 and 2022, our effort was kickstarted by using Good Sciencings’ data set. Although it would appear they periodically review their list and remove individuals who ought not be included, as of the 1st of October 2022, there are still a number of entries that ought to be removed. For instance, Ethan Bradley (28, UK), a cycle courier who’s death, it would appear, was the result of a head injury he suffered a week before his death is included in Good Sciencings’s figures. Footballer Leon Taylor (36) is marked as a UK athlete, but is in fact, US-based. Katie Meyer (US, 22) and Cameron Burrell (US, 26) committed suicide, as did Sarah Shulze (US, 21) and Jeremy Giambi (US, 47). In March 2022, Yahoo Sport published the headlines; “Tennis world stunned after Miami Open carnage”. The full list of withdrawals is available here. Reasons cited include ‘viral illness’, ‘personal reasons’, and ‘right wrist injury’. All of these individuals are included in Good Sciencing’s list. Within the UK itself, about a dozen such examples were identified, all of which have been logged in the data sheet.

After data entry was completed, record deduplication was done by checking for duplicate names. Any entries flagged as duplicates were checked and removed where relevant.

Messages were also shared on Twitter (see here and here) asking people to send in any stories they’d found, in order to maximise coverage.

Results

For the period 2008 – 2022, 276 incidents were logged. These were reported on by a wide range of national and local media news outlets, including Mirror, BBC, Daily Mail, Wales Online, Daily Record, The Sun, The Guardian and others.

The number of reported incidents appears to have been steadily growing over time. Starting from 2016, a marked increase can be seen. It is interesting to note that many of these stories were shared on Social Media by the publishers, but appear to have received very little attention at the time (see for example here and here).

Peak fatalities occurred in 2019 and then fell sharply in 2020 and 2021. The number of fatalities has gone up again since 2021, but at present is still lower than 2019.

The fatality rate appears to have been declining since 2020, possibly as a result of more safety precautions being taken (e.g. installation of portable defibrillators).

In most cases, the exact cause of the incident could not be ascertained from the report. These make up the majority of cases. Heart attack / failure and other heart conditions come in second and third place respectively.

As found in the aforementioned studies, football and rugby featured predominantly.

Limitations

Any kind of analysis, such as that presented here is only as good as the quality of the underlying data. Wikipedia for instance, have a page where they feature a “selected list of football players who died on or near the pitch”. The Exposé used these figures to write an article titled “Worldwide Heart Attack Deaths among Pro-Footballers in 2021 were 300% higher than the 12-year-average”. The problem with this approach is that it doesn’t provide the full picture. The same problem applies here, and although measures were taken to try to ensure no report was missed, it is inevitable that some where.

Geography and time frame are another limitation, so a good next step would be to try and replicate this research for other countries. Support can be provided to any individual or group of individuals who wish to undertake this task.

Discussion

The phenomenon documented here could be explained by one of the following:

1.) There has been no change in the incidence rate for the period studied, but an increase in the reporting rate which gives the impression of an underlying change.

2.) The incidence rate has changed, and the reporting rate reflects that change.

In 2008, UK charity CRY (Cardiac Risk in the Young) published an article where they stated that “young people who lose their lives from the tragic condition sudden cardiac death now stands at 12 every week – a staggering 50% rise on previous estimates”. In 2016, a study published in The Lancet concluded that the incidence rate of myocarditis is on the rise globally, increasing “from about 1.5 million annually to 2.2 million cases from 2013 to 2015”.

In the UK, the ONS (Office for National Statistics) provides a tool (Nomis) that provides figures for the underlying cause of death from 2013 onwards. All cause mortality, across all age groups, went up in 2020, prior to the deployment of the COVID vaccine.

Looking specifically at ‘acute myocardial infarction’ (the closest equivalent to the ‘heart attack / failure’ category used in our research) we find that within the age group that we are most concerned with (under 35), there does not appear to be any significant change in the period data is available for.

These figures are not specific to athletes, however, the aforementioned study published in 2018 by Sharma et al. suggested that a more granular analysis revealed a significant increase in the incidence rate in football players. So although the incidence rate at a national level may not have changed much or even gone down in some age groups, it is possible that within these groups, detectable increases can be found, as Sharma et al.’s results appear to show.

Assuming that this is indeed a growing phenomenon, then like rising ‘auto-immune diseases’, genetic factors do not appear to provide an adequate explanation, which then leaves environmental factors. In 2014, a study was published where the authors found that “no clear link with any air pollutant was found for cardiovascular deaths, with the exception of PM2.5 which was linked to an increased risk of irregular heart rhythms, irregular heart beat and blood clots in the lungs”. In April 2022, Bath rugby club used Dyson backpacks to measure players' exposure to air pollution. And in July 2022, tennis player Novak Djokovic was seen apparently inhaling “air from a bottle”. It is also interesting to note that on occasion, reports of animals being affected are published. For instance, in 2022, a horse died of “suspected heart attack” at the Grand National.

In April 2022, a spike in cases of hepatitis in young children under 10 was reported in the UK. By May 2022, it was reported that “at least 20 countries reported 228 cases of pediatric hepatitis of unknown etiology or origin, with more than 50 suspected cases still under investigation”. Although the COVID vaccines were the obvious cause to many, various health authorities, including the UK Health Security Agency later confirmed that none of the children concerned had been vaccinated; “the majority of cases are under 5 years old and too young to have received the vaccine”.

Summary

The findings presented here do not appear to support the hypothesis that the COVID vaccines are playing an important role in what appears to be an increase in the reporting rate of athletes suddenly collapsing and in some cases, dying. This hypothesis certainly cannot explain the sudden increase that started in 2016.

Although the apparent increase in reporting rate does not appear to correlate with any increase in the actual incidence rate at a national level, if Sharma et al.’s findings are correct, then there is good reason to think that the increase in the reporting rate reflects to some degree, an increase in the incidence rate.

Thank you as always to Caroline for her invaluable help and support in pulling this research together, and thank you to those who contributed to the research by sending links to news reports.