--- title: Football Hurts Children description: Why do we let kids play football? Plus, a possible treatment for Lou Gehrig's disease, Saudi Arabia's pending collapse and more. canonical: https://time.com/4059230/football-hurt-kids/ author: TIME article:opinion: true article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-10-02T16:01:33.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T05:01:23.870Z article:section: Ideas og:title: Football Is Hurting Our Children og:description: These are today's best ideas og:url: https://time.com/4059230/football-hurt-kids/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Football Is Hurting Our Children twitter:description: These are today's best ideas twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # Football Is Hurting Our Children by [The Aspen Institute](https://time.com/author/the-aspen-institute/) ## The Aspen Institute Oct 2, 2015 4:01 PM UTC by [The Aspen Institute](https://time.com/author/the-aspen-institute/) ## The Aspen Institute Oct 2, 2015 4:01 PM UTC **1\.** [**Alone among our sports spectacles, American football kills our children.**](http://grantland.com/the-triangle/the-death-of-evan-murray/) By Charles P. Pierce in Grantland **2\.** [**An ancient virus trapped in our DNA might cause Lou Gehrig’s disease. And HIV treatment could help.**](http://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/ancient-virus-may-cause-crippling-disease-als-study-finds-n436911) By Maggie Fox at NBC News **3\.** [**Water and oil: Is Saudi Arabia heading for a collapse?**](http://www.middleeasteye.net/columns/collapse-saudi-arabia-inevitable-1895380679#sthash.C34c1bhk.dpuf) By Nafeez Ahmed in Middle East Eye **4\.** [**Transparent solar panels mean every window could become a renewable energy source.**](http://wilsonquarterly.com/stories/transparent-solar-panels-could-be-a-game-changer-for-renewable-energy/) By Stephanie Lu in Wilson Quarterly **5\.** [**Researchers discovered a surprisingly simple way to get kids to eat their veggies — serve boring entrees.**](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonkblog/wp/2015/09/29/researchers-have-found-a-simple-way-to-get-kids-to-eat-more-veggies/) By Roberto Ferdman in the Washington Post  [_The Aspen Institute_](http://www.aspeninstitute.org/) _is an educational and policy studies organization based in Washington, D.C._ ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"OpinionNewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4059230/football-hurt-kids/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4059230/football-hurt-kids/"},"headline":"Football Is Hurting Our Children","datePublished":"2015-10-02T16:01:33.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T05:01:23.870Z","description":"These are today's best ideas","url":"https://time.com/4059230/football-hurt-kids/","keywords":["Innovation","Vegetables","Football","Saudi Arabia","solar","ALS"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"The Aspen Institute","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/the-aspen-institute/"}],"articleSection":"Ideas","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/ideas/","name":"Ideas"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/innovation/","name":"Innovation"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4059230/football-hurt-kids/","name":"Football Is Hurting Our Children"}}]}] ```