The researchers also estimate that around one in four of the former football players had dementia, a common feature of late-stage CTE

October 30, 2026 11:46 a.m.

Researchers say that CTE is very preventable, since less than 1 percent of brains from the general public show signs of it. Scott Taetsch via Getty Images

American football is famously a dangerous sport. In August, a study found that at least one in four recently deceased former NFL players had a brain disease called chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE, forcing a conversation around safety in the sport.

The actual image might be even starker. New work by some of the same researchers suggests that three in four of the retired professional athletes who died from 2008 through 2023 likely had CTE. The findings were published in the journal JAMA Network Open on October 28.

“More than 20 million men alive today in the U.S.…