Stats for deaths in American football?

Statistics

From 1931 to 2006, the National Center for Catastrophic Sport Injury Research has reported 1,006 direct and 683 indirect fatalities resulting from participation in all organized football (professional, college, high school, and sandlot) in the US [2]. While the yearly number of indirect fatalities has remained near 9.0 per year, the yearly number of direct fatalities has declined from an average of 18.6 per year between 1931-1970, 9.5 per year from 1971–1990, to 4.3 per year from 1991-2006. In 2006, with an estimated 1.8 million participants in organized football, the survey reported a relatively high 16 indirect deaths but only one fatality directly attributable to football play (a high school running back who suffered a fatal spinal injury when tackled).[2][3]

On the other hand, the number of injuries (per participant) seems to have increased over the years: a 1994 Ball State University survey found that "players in the 1980s suffered serious injuries and underwent operations at twice the rate of those who played in the 1950s or earlier".[4] A 2000 University of North Carolina study found that in the period between 1977 and 1998, each year on average 13 athletes had suffered catastrophic injuries (primarily permanent paralysis) through direct result of participation in football: "200 football players received a permanent cervical cord injury, and 66 sustained a permanent cerebral injury".[3] Concussions are common, with an estimated 40,000 suffered every year among high school players alone [5]. The National Football League now collects benchmark measures of awareness for each player, which can be used during a game to judge whether he has been concussed. - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_issues_in_Amer...

American Football

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Stats for deaths in American football?

I'm doing some comparative analysis on the relative dangers of playing rugby union and American football. In several places, I have seen the number "600 to 700 deaths" since the 1930s quoted -- on a Penn and Teller documentary for one. Is anyone aware of the source of these figures,...