Mind & body, in brief

A Boston University team estimates that about 3 in 4 former NFL players died with CTE. [1]

CTE, chronic traumatic encephalopathy, is a brain disease linked to repeated blows to the head. [3]

In CTE, a brain protein called tau goes wrong and forms damaging clumps. [3]

The disease can only be confirmed after death, by examining the brain. [3]

After the August study, the NFL said it works to reduce concussions and head impacts. [2]

No test can yet confirm CTE in a living player. [1]

So the risk to today's players is hard to know, Tripodis says. [1]

Lonser says the next answer needs living players followed over time, beside men never hit. [1]

A Boston University team says about 3 in 4 former NFL players who died from 2008 to 2023 had CTE, but only about 400 of 2,362 brains were ever examined, so the 74.5% is a model built on which families chose to give. [1][3]

One round figure about famous players reads like a fact about anyone who took hits to the head. It is an estimate about men who have already died. [1]

A count that weighs for who gave brains gives them a firmer number than the 99% that critics could dismiss as skewed. [3]

How many players alive today will develop CTE.

No test confirms CTE in a living person, and the estimate covers only players who died from 2008 to 2023. [1]

How much of the brain damage and dementia comes from football itself.

The study had no comparison group of men who never played contact sport, an outside surgeon says. [1]

Whether the weighing caught every reason families gave a brain.

The correction uses what medical and death records show; a reason no record holds would still tilt the count. [1]

How many of the 74.5% would ever have had symptoms.

The figure includes early brain changes that may never cause symptoms, and only about 27% had dementia. [1][2]

Ofcom, the UK's online safety regulator, set out how apps should check users are over 16. [8]

The UK's ban on under-16s using social media is due to start in March next year. [8]

It will keep under-16s off 10 of the biggest platforms, including Instagram, TikTok and Snapchat. [8]

Many 16 and 17 year olds have no credit card, full driving licence or passport. [8]

So Ofcom recommends 4 methods it calls highly effective, alongside ordinary ID. [8]

Ofcom admits some children will still get round the checks. [8]

Many adults will also have to prove their age to keep using these apps. [8]

The UK government will decide on Ofcom's methods by the end of the year. [8]

How many UK children will get round the age checks.

Ofcom admits some will, and has no firm number for how many adults will have to prove their age. [8]

Staying one more year at school lowered dementia decades later, a new study finds. [9]

A 1972 law in England, Wales and Scotland raised the school-leaving age from 15 to 16. [10]

It applied only to children born after 1 September 1957. [10]

So children born just before and just after that date can be fairly compared. [10]

Researchers from Wisconsin and Southern California studied over 100,000 people in the UK Biobank. [9]

The UK Biobank is a large health study that follows volunteers. [9]

The extra year cut dementia by about 0.88 percentage points, most for people with risky genes. [10]

The team says it can trust the direction of the effect, not its exact size. [10]

Diagnoses were counted only up to age 65, so the gap may grow or shrink. [9]

How scientists counted a brain disease in brains they never saw

Only the brains families give can be checked, about 400 of 2,362

Families give more often after seeing symptoms, about 5 times more often

Records exist for every player, whether the brain was given or not

Those records show which kinds of player were over-given

Each checked brain is counted down when its kind was over-given

The count for all players lands at 74.5%, between the floor and the ceiling

You cannot fix a lopsided sample by checking more of it. You fix it by finding a record of everyone, learning who came forward, and weighing each case by that.

Five counts of the same disease, all from the briefing above. The donated brains sit high; counting every unexamined brain as healthy sits low. The weighed estimate falls between.

The team also took diagnoses from hospital records and death registers, so people never diagnosed while alive were still counted.

The weighing can only correct for what the records show. If families gave brains for a reason no record holds, the estimate still carries that tilt.

About 400 families chose to give a brain, and about 2,000 did not. Each family saw one player; the 74.5% exists only when their records are laid side by side.

How much an extra year at school really cuts dementia.

The authors say they trust the direction of the effect but not its size, and diagnoses were counted only up to age 65. [10][9]

An extra year at school, forced on children in England, Wales and Scotland by a 1972 law, left fewer of them with dementia decades later. The drop was largest among people whose genes put them at high risk.

Hospitals in Montana, Oregon and Missouri closed intensive care units for children this past year. [11]

US hospitals with children's overnight wings fell from 1,749 to 1,226 between 2008 and 2022. [11]

Hospitals cite too few patients, because few children ever need intensive care. [11]

Children's specialists also earn less, and hospitals are often paid less to treat children. [11]

In Missoula, Montana, the unit that closed this month saw about 2 such children a month. [11]

The sickest children there will now be stabilised and sent on to other hospitals. [11]

The next children's intensive care unit in Montana is about 150 miles north. [11]

Researchers warn US cuts to Medicaid, health cover for poorer families, will widen the gaps. [11]

Converting beds for children into beds for adults or newborns cuts costs where children are few and pay less. [11]

With Missoula's unit closed, the sickest will be stabilised and sent on, and the next unit in the state is about 150 miles north. [11]

How many children are harmed by longer trips to intensive care.

Hospitals cite low numbers of patients, but no count of outcomes after transfer is given for Missoula or the other closures. [11]

US family carers now spend $11,508 a year of their own money, a survey found. [12]

AARP, a big US group for older people, surveyed 2,538 family carers. [12]

That spending is about 60% higher than five years ago. [12]

Prices overall rose 24% in that time, so carers' costs rose more than twice as fast. [12]

On average, the spending takes 31% of a carer's income. [12]

Food, housing and medical bills make up the biggest part. [12]

Many carers cut their hours or quit work, so they lose pay as costs rise. [12]

Medicare, the US health plan for over-65s, does not pay for routine help at home. [12]

They spend $11,508 a year of their own money, 31% of their income on average, and many cut their working hours. [12]

A wasp sting in Virginia sent Stephanie Rowell into anaphylaxis, a severe allergic reaction. [13]

She had no health insurance, and the urgent care clinic asked for $400 before the shot. [13]

The shot was epinephrine, the drug in an EpiPen, which reverses the reaction. [13]

Her bill was $400 for the drug, $40 to give it and $165 for the visit. [13]

That came to $605 in all. [13]

TruHealthNow, which owns the clinic, says asking for payment did not delay the shot. [13]

US law makes hospital emergency rooms stabilise anyone, but most urgent care centres are exempt. [13]

US urgent care centres handled about 185 million visits in 2025. [13]

Most urgent care centres are not bound by the law that makes hospital emergency rooms stabilise anyone. [13]

Whether asking for payment slowed Stephanie Rowell's treatment.

She says she was asked for $400 before the shot; the clinic's owners say the request did not delay it. [13]

From 18 November, US donation teams may talk to families earlier about giving organs. [14]

Until now, they could speak only after a family chose to end life support. [14]

The network that runs US transplants voted for the change on 20 August. [14]

It covers donation after the heart stops, now about half of all US organ donations. [14]

Officials say it will prevent mistakes, including patients taken to surgery while still alive. [14]

Lainie Ross, a bioethicist, fears families will feel pressured and manipulated. [14]

More than 109,000 Americans are waiting for an organ, and about 12 die each day. [14]

So families deciding about life support may now meet the donation team sooner. [14]

Donation teams may speak to families sooner from 18 November, which officials say gives teams time to honour a donor's wish. [14]

Private investment firms now own more than a third of US methadone clinics. [15]

Methadone treats opioid addiction and cuts the risk of a fatal overdose by about half. [15]

Only 22% of people with opioid addiction ever receive it. [15]

A Brown University economist found the buyers did not open more clinics. [15]

Only licensed clinics may give methadone, and many make patients come in every day. [15]

In rural areas the average one-way drive is close to 50 minutes. [15]

US Senator Maggie Hassan is investigating 3 of the biggest clinic owners. [15]

More than 120 people a day died of opioid overdoses in the US in 2025. [15]

Only licensed clinics may give methadone, so owning the clinics in a region means owning the only way in for patients. [15]

Belfast's city-centre needle exchange will close on 2 November after losing its building. [16]

The charity Extern runs it, giving people who inject drugs clean needles and health help. [16]

Almost 20,000 used needles were handed back there last year. [16]

Extern's outreach team also picked up more than 13,000 needles from the streets. [16]

That street count is about 20% higher than in earlier years. [16]

The building is being redeveloped, and a year-long search found no new site. [16]

Extern says 1,000 to 1,500 people in the city struggle with drug use at any time. [16]

A much smaller street service will replace it until a new site is found. [16]

The needle exchange shuts on 2 November and is replaced by a much smaller street service. [16]

A Northern Ireland health trust has cut a crisis scheme for young people to weekdays. [17]

The scheme gives a young person in crisis at hospital a written appointment before they leave. [17]

The Western trust, in the north west, says the cut began in August to save money. [17]

It applies only to young people judged low risk who come in out of hours. [17]

Northern Ireland's health trusts must find savings of up to 12% over three years. [17]

A Londonderry GP, Joe McEvoy, says distress in young people peaks at weekends. [17]

So a young person in crisis on a Friday evening may now wait until Monday. [17]

Elsewhere today, help for people already struggling was cut back: children's intensive care in Montana, weekend crisis appointments for young people in Northern Ireland, and Belfast's needle exchange. [11][17][16]

Those judged low risk out of hours now wait for the next working day, so a Friday evening visit can mean waiting until Monday. [17]

Callan Lanigan, 18, has autism and ADHD and lives in County Londonderry, Northern Ireland. [18]

A test after his 18th birthday put his IQ above 70. [18]

In Northern Ireland, that score bars him from adult learning disability services. [18]

As a child he had been assessed as having special educational needs. [18]

In England, a care plan can run until a young person turns 25. [18]

His mother says the help they had was taken away because of one test. [18]

The Northern Trust says it must fund care through set mental health and disability programmes. [18]

England's health secretary Yvette Cooper dropped a plan to abolish Healthwatch England, the NHS patient champion. [19]

Healthwatch and its 150 local branches collect what patients say about NHS care. [19]

Labour, Conservative and Liberal Democrat MPs and peers had opposed scrapping it. [19]

It has reported on dental access and years-long waits for ADHD assessments. [19]

It is one of several U-turns on the health bill since Andy Burnham became prime minister. [19]

Ministers had planned to move its work into local NHS boards and councils. [19]

Councils had warned that NHS bodies would then be marking their own homework. [19]

England kept Healthwatch, its independent NHS patient watchdog, and its 150 local branches after MPs from every main party objected to scrapping it.

England's care regulator put Saxon Lodge, a Canterbury care home, into special measures. [20]

Asked when she could go home, a resident was told she would leave 'when she died'. [20]

Inspectors found medicines were not managed safely. [20]

One resident who needed pureed food was given lumpy puree, risking choking. [20]

Relatives were sometimes called in at night because staff could not calm people. [20]

Inspectors visited in July, when 21 people lived there. [20]

The regulator has begun action against the home, which it can appeal. [20]

A US study linked wildfire smoke in pregnancy to a higher chance of autism in children. [21]

It followed about 900,000 mothers and children for an average of 6.3 years. [21]

Each rise of 0.75 micrograms per cubic metre of smoke particles came with 30% higher risk. [21]

The link was strongest in the second and third trimesters, the last six months of pregnancy. [21]

Lead author Stefania Papatheodorou works at the Rutgers School of Public Health. [21]

The study only observed people, so it cannot show the smoke caused autism. [21]

Wildfire smoke can travel far, even when it cannot be seen, she said. [21]

Whether wildfire smoke in pregnancy causes autism.

The study of about 900,000 mothers and children only observed people, so it shows a link and not a cause. [21]

Lahore, in Pakistan's Punjab province, was ranked the world's most polluted major city on Thursday. [22]

Lahore's air quality score read 419, against 274 in Cairo and 220 in Delhi. [22]

By 1pm Lahore's score had fallen to 183, fifth on the list. [22]

Punjab's environment agency demolished 197 brick kilns that broke the rules in a month. [22]

It also seized 45,100 kilograms of plastic to stop it being burned. [22]

The peak smog season has not yet arrived, the paper Dawn reports. [22]

Smoky vehicles, kilns, factories, burning plastic and building dust are all being targeted. [22]

TikTok influencers say pale skin, dark circles and hair loss reveal 'ferritin face'. [23]

Ferritin is the protein that stores iron in the body, especially in the liver. [23]

Those looks can also come from genes, stress or not drinking enough. [23]

Sue Pavord, an Oxford blood specialist, says iron deficiency cannot be diagnosed from the face. [23]

Periods and pregnancies are the most common causes of low iron, she says. [23]