Killer Football

The Euro 2008 football tournament was widely heralded as one of the greatest European Championships in history. The tournament had everything a football fan could wish for, with attacking play, dozens of goals, heroic comebacks and tense finishes.

Euro2008 was so good, in fact, that it actually killed several supporters.

The first casualty was a Turkish fan who got so worked up over Turkey’s victory over Switzerland in the opening stages of the tournament that he fell dead on the spot. A few weeks later the Turk was joined on the sidelines of life by an Austrian supporter who perished during his side’s tense encounter against Germany.

Football Infarction

The handful of fans who passed away in Swiss and Austrian football stadiums were in all likelihood the most obvious victims of a silent plague that took a heavy toll on over-zealous football fans during the Euro 2008 Championship.

These individuals were the victims of a well documented phenomenon that is believed to claim the lives of nearly 2000 football fans a year. Football infarction is the term given to the spontaneous deaths of football fans whose hearts can’t keep pace with the on-field action.

The sudden death of football fans has been extensively researched by medical scientists in England, who discovered that the risk for heart failure rose by 25% amongst the general male population on the day of a match featuring the national team.

The researchers studied mortality statistics and hospital admissions for the day following England’s matches at the 1998 Football World Cup. Areas of investigation included motor vehicle accidents, myocardial infarctions (heart attacks), strokes and acts of self-harm.

The only one of these to experience a significant increase was myocardial infarction, which took a heavy toll on couch bound England supporters. Since this condition was first discovered, additional research has been conducted to determine how and why so many football fans are dying for the love of the game.

Heart Stopping Action

Laboratory studies have found that it is the excitement levels reached during football matches that kill. Test have shown that a passive fan’s heartbeat can increase to as much as 160 beats per second during a football match – roughly equivalent to the heartbeat of the players out on the pitch.

The reason why the footballers don’t drop dead on the pitch is that their heartbeat levels are accompanied by heavy respiration, which ensures that sufficient oxygen reaches their hearts. The same cannot be said for the football fans munching on crisps and swigging lager, whose frenzied hearts are fed under-oxygenated blood, and are therefore more likely to go on strike.

Surviving Football Infarction

Knowing that watching football puts one at increased risk of having a heart attack is sobering news for the sport’s most rabid fans. However, football fans can take a number of precautionary measures to ensure that they don’t become part of the football infarction statistics:

• Breathe: Humans have a tendency to breathe shallowly during tense situations, which in turn puts pressure on the heart. Remember to take long deep breaths if you feel yourself becoming too excited during a football match.
• Play football: The fitter you are the less likely you are to fall victim to football infarction.

Here’s wishing all the English Premier League football fans and followers of England’s national team and happy, healthy and heart attack free football season.

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