Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI), including concussion and CTE, is the leading cause of death and disability in Australia and worldwide.
It is a ‘silent’ epidemic as society is largely unaware of the magnitude of the problem. Australia has a national brain injury crisis. We have one of the highest rates of acquired brain injury in the world at 3% of the population. The USA has 2%. Why is it so? In part, due to the massive popularity of AFL and Rugby in Australia, two high risk, dangerous sports which have the highest rates of concussion of any team sports in the world. Worse, they are increasing annually, very rapidly at junior level. This is compounded by the fact that there is very significant under-reporting of concussion in Australian sport. Lives are being destroyed. Self-regulation by peak bodies has failed.