Kenosha Reporter

While much of the world is becoming aware of the heart issues occurring after vaccination, it is unclear if local athletics are catching up with the threat of cardiac arrest in younger athletes post-vaccine.

Kenosha Youth Sports has yet to announce if heart exams should be required with sports physicals for young athletes. Kenosha Youth Sports oversees sporting events for children 4 to 18 in the Kenosha area. Sports regularly provided by the league include basketball, baseball, softball, soccer, football and golf

In 2021, the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine was linked to expected myocarditis in 1 in every 5,000 young men after being vaccinated. That link may be showing up on sports fields now with increasing reports of young men keeling over during competition. 

The findings have many experts suggesting against vaccination in otherwise healthy young men.

“Studying the safety and efficacy of any medications, including vaccines, is an important component of public health,” Florida Surgeon General Dr. Joe Ladapo said in a press release, who in October 2022 suggested against men under the age of 39 receiving COVID-19 vaccines due to related cardiac problems after receiving the vaccine.

“Far less attention has been paid to safety and the concerns of many individuals have been dismissed – these are important findings that should be communicated to Floridians.”

Florida’s data found an increase in 84% of cardiac-related deaths in men between 18 and 39 within 28 days of receiving an mRNA vaccine. 

In the past month , the high-profile collapse of NFL’s Damar Hamlin has many questioning the safety of COVID-19 vaccines. Hamlin was notoriously hospitalized, and the game between the Bills and Bengals was cancelled following his collapse. 

Hamlin’s cardiac arrest has led to much speculation, especially amid reports of several other young athletes suffering from the same problem. 

“We don't know exactly why Damar Hamlin collapsed last night, but at the same time, there are concerns about cases like this, young athletes collapsing on the field of heart problems. And there has been a dramatic increase in this,” Host Tucker Carlson said while discussing Hamlin’s collapse on Fox News. 

“You're not imagining it. What is this? Cardiologist Peter McCullough and researcher Angus Paul, critics looked into this trend. In Europe, European sports leagues. They found that prior to COVID and the COVID-19 vaccines, there were roughly 29 cardiac arrests in those European sports leagues per year since the vaccine campaign began. There have been more than 1,500 total cardiac arrests in those leagues, and two-thirds of those were fatal. Does that prove something? We don't know. But you should know that.”

Last year, the University of Florida's Keyontae Johnson collapsed on the court, Gatorsports reported. Johnson was diagnosed with myocarditis after the incident in which a defibrillator was applied to his chest after collapsing. He was noted as being in critical condition the day after the incident. Johnson was the team’s top scorer but missed two seasons after the incident, returning to the court only in November of 2022.

NBA legend John Stockton, who played point guard for the Utah Jazz from 1984 to 2003 and was later an assistant coach at Montana State, also noted the phenomenon of young men collapsing during athletic events. He previously told the Spokane, Washington's Spokesman-Review that he personally knew of 150 athletes who have suddenly died or had a cardiac arrest while playing sports. Stockton has since adjusted that number, noting it has increased and continues to increase.

“I knew at the time 150 was dramatically low and I thought it was in the area of 300,” Stockton recently told veteran sportscaster Michele Tafoya. “So when I went and spoke at the Spokesman-Review, we had a nice interview and they asked that. And of course, whatever FactCheck.org or .com is, came out said, well, that's baloney. I went back and put together names, pictures [and] faces where they played. I had over 300 at the time, so I felt pretty secure with my little 150. And people had to come out and argue that I had the proof in my hands, a piece of paper with their name. So it's way more than that now. And I think it's in the thousands now. But don't quote me on that one.”

An Archives of Pathology & Laboratory Medicine paper released in mid-2022 found direct evidence that heart failure caused by the second dose of vaccination has resulted in the deaths of young men.

“Myocarditis in adolescents has been diagnosed clinically following the administration of the second dose of an mRNA vaccine for coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19),” the paper reads.

This is based on direct evidence from autopsy, which, as the study says, has not been conducted in many other cases of suspicious death after vaccination. The lead author is Yale University medical professor James R. Gill. Given the low rate of death and/or significant disease in children due to COVID-19 and the lack of significant benefit from vaccinations, many researchers have said those receiving the vaccine consider this when making medical decisions.