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Case against NFL for workers comp for head injuries dismissed

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Case against NFL for workers comp for head injuries dismissed

A U.S. District Court judge in Miami has dismissed a lawsuit filed in November against the National Football League by former players seeking workers compensation for chronic traumatic encephalopathy. 

As part of the suit, filed Nov. 21, 38 former professional football players claimed that the lifelong and debilitating brain injury caused by repeated head trauma, was once only diagnosable in dead players, but “living CTE has now become clinically diagnosable." The players wanted their 32 former teams named in the lawsuit and for the NFL to acknowledge recent medical advances and pay workers comp.

U.S. District Judge Beth Bloom on Wednesday dismissed the suit “without prejudice” and declared all pending motions “denied as moot.” 

Neither the NFL nor Tim Howard, the attorney representing the formers players, could be reached for comment. 

The lawsuit stated that players “have sustained excessive and undue occupational head trauma, including severe concussions and frequent sub-concussive head injuries, which have unquestionably occurred" as employees for the NFL. The players claimed that their employers “routinely failed to care for (their) repetitive head injuries during their careers in any medically competent or meaningful manner that complied with any known published contact sports return-to-play guidelines at the time in which the injuries occurred.”

The players had demanded a jury trial and wanted the NFL and the workers comp boards to acknowledge CTE as a “distinct occupational disease” with a “latent manifestation” that shows up in clinical diagnoses many years after players retire. 

 

 

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