'Headers in football are a slow but steady killer and must be banned' argues Scottish lobby group
Now is the time to ban headers from football amid growing evidence of their link to heightened dementia risk, a Scottish campaign group has argued.
Heading Out said 2024 was the perfect year to ramp up pressure on the game's authorities to change the rules, arguing that Scotland's qualification for the Euros is the perfect jumping on point.
"Scotland’s qualification for this year’s European Championships should be a line in the sand moment," said Mike Edwards, a former STV journalist, dementia campaigner and founder of Heading Out.
"It’s Europe’s biggest footballing stage and Scotland’s qualification is a keystone moment. We should build on the momentum the tournament is generating here and use it to put pressure on FIFA and UEFA to look again at changing the rules,"said Mike.
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"Heading the ball has killed some of the sport’s biggest names like Billy McNeill, Ally MacLeod, Frank Kopel and recently, Gordon McQueen. The rules have to change. Heading has to be removed," he added.
Heading Out said its calls echo the findings of recent Scottish academic studies which revealed that footballers are three-and-a-half times more likely to receive a diagnosis of a neuropathological disease like dementia – and five times more likely if they were a defender.
Mike, who retired from STV to care for his elderly mother Margaret after her dementia diagnosis said: "Heading the ball is a slow but steady killer. We learn from an early age not to handle the ball, surely we can learn not to head it either. I’d like to see heading banned altogether after the 2030 World Cup, which I think is a reasonable deadline if we start now. Not heading the ball will save lives."
More details about the organisation and the team behind it can be found at headingout.scot and Mike and the team can be contacted via the website.
