Thread by @Mike_Honey_

This AFL season, I've been struck by how many mentions of "illness" there have been. I assume most of these are COVID cases, and here's an analysis that confirms that assumption.

For 2024 (so far), mentions of illness are around 850% higher than the pre-COVID baseline.
#AFL
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I searched the AFL website for mentions of "illness" by year, starting in 2016 (using the Tools / Custom Date Range feature).
The results were quite striking - after years of a fairly static level of 30-40, they have exploded since 2021 - when Australia #LetItRip.
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Now a possible confounder is that the AFLW (Womens) league started in 2018 and has expanded since. But as you can see below, that can explain a trivial fraction of the growth in "illness", even assuming that the illness of AFLW players was covered evenly.
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From 2020 to 2024, the teams involved only grew by 13%, whereas illness mentions grew by 850%.

Really the AFLW teams could be weighted lower, as their season is shorter - in 2024 their regular season is only 10 rounds, vs 24 for the AFL.
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While (like most sports) the AFL are careful to avoid specific mention of COVID specifically, it seems fairly certain that this is driving this change.
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What other disease suddenly changed it's impact on the Australian population in 2021, and has been having a greater and greater impact for every year since?
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Before any anti-vaxxers come out (to be immediately blocked), please consider that Australia's vaccination deployment has been insignificant since 2022, while the trend shown above has continued to gain momentum.
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Compared to 2023, illness mentions grew almost 50% in 2024 (so far) - a period when very few vaccine doses have been given and eligibility has been limited.
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It's distressing to consider the impact on the long-term health of the players if this is allowed to continue. There's clearly a cumulative effect building, and higher levels of illness in any squad would put pressure on the players to play on while ill.
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Here's a current example - from 4:40 a coach discusses the extended illness of one of his star players. The stress and distress are palpable - the team are one game away from playing in a Grand Final.

🧵afl.com.au/video/1219181

That's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity that not all players get a chance at, after a lifetime of dedication to their sport. The language is guarded, but he makes it crystal clear that the player contracted COVID.
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But this should be a positive opportunity for the AFL and the clubs to showcase a focus on player (and staff) health. Australia is home to many world-leading scientific talents who could advise on mitigations, like Prof's Lidia Morawska

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https://x.com/glbabbington/status/1787368903913668750

... and Brendan Crabb and his team at the Burnet Institute:

🧵burnet.edu.au/knowledge-and-…

They could also draw on the elite sports-medicine expertise that guided the Australian Olympic team to it's best-ever performance in the midst of a COVID wave - people like A/Prof Carolyn Broderick .
🧵x.com/carolyn_brod

Here's a thread that goes through the protections used by the Australian Olympic team. I can't see why all of them cannot be implemented for any elite sport.

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https://x.com/smpwrgr/status/1812859394377552368

The AFL could be a world leader in tackling this challenge head-on. It is locked in a global competition for talent, so the sports that move first to protect the health of their athletes will have an advantage.
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We've seen this play out recently with concussion - some sports are still trying to ignore that issue, which deters players and their parents from participating.
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As a fan of the AFL, it is frustrating that this can go on for years with seemingly no response from the AFL or the clubs. Whichever clubs can implement protections and get their illness rate down could expect to see a much-reduced impact on player availability and health.
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As with concussion, it's uncomfortable to consider that your engagement and spending as a fan is indirectly encouraging players to risk their health (from a threat external to their sport). The players didn't sign up for that, so the AFL and clubs surely have a duty of care.
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In an artificially close competition (salary caps, draft etc), smart clubs would jump at the chance to gain an advantage over their rivals. Perhaps some already are, but I haven't heard anything about that.
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More broadly, I don't think I've seen such a striking demonstration of the cumulative impact of COVID in any other population group or type of statistic. I'm wondering if this is happening across our community, or are elite sportspeople particularly vulnerable to this?
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I can well imagine elite sportspeople being more inclined or pushed to "soldier on" and play & train at an elite level when they should be resting and recovering from a COVID infection.
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I assume similar trends are playing out in all sports globally? I can't see any reason why this would be limited to just AFL or just Australia.
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If someone is interested, this topic could be the basis of an interesting study.
Some questions come to my mind:
- are the illness mentions correlated with the waves of COVID?
- are the illness mentions distributed evenly by club? by AFL vs AFLW?
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The AFL themselves do produce a report on injuries and the latest available for the 2023 season does mention "medical illness" as one of the 4 most common injury categories. But that is not quantified in the report, which is mostly narrative.

🧵 endsafl.com.au/news/1211880/a…