Lou Gehrig's Disease In Sports

Sports have always been a kind of national pride for American citizens and an important part of the culture, however, in the early years of the Twentieth Century, there were cases of a strange disease that athletes were contracting. This disease, now known as ALS or Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis,was known then as Lou Gehrig’s Disease, dubbed after the famous baseball player who contracted, and eventually died of this disease while in his prime years. While ALS has been a prime assailant in the athletic world, Lou Gehrig’s case was the first big eye opener to America about how deadly this strange disease really was. Since those days, many other athletes have contracted and succumbed to ALS. Because of the deadliness of this disease, there are
Recent studies have found that athletes are contracting ALS at a much younger age compared to the age most normal people are diagnosed with it. Scientists have been working day and night to find the answers to this. The results, have shown that repeated blows to the head can cause a toxic protein to leak across the brain which is what deteriorates the brain cells. Since this toxic protein can spread throughout the body, once it reaches the spinal cord, it begins to make the nerve cells wither away. A big factor of the toxic protein leaking, is repeated blows to the head, or repeated concussions without fully resting. Athletes are at the highest risk of getting ALS because they are constantly getting hit in the head multiple times a game and could end up getting multiple concussions per game, and maybe not realizing that they even have a concussion, since not everyone will pass out from getting one which usually makes people believe that they’re perfectly fine, but in reality their brain has been injured, however that is an internal injury, so it’s impossible to be sure. There are a multitude of other factors that can be associated with explaining why so many athletes are being diagnosed with ALS. One of the biggest factors, is the amount of rest an athlete is getting after receiving a concussion or just a severe head injury in