Germany to monitor health of 300 retired soccer players

Germany has launched a study of professional soccer players’ health after retirement in an attempt to understand the game’s long-term effects.

The German soccer federation, the league, and a major insurance institution have teamed up to invest 450,000 euros ($495,000) to study 300 former players over three years.

Aged between 40 and 69, the players must have competed in Germany’s top two men’s divisions, its top women’s league or a foreign league of comparable status.

They will undergo the same hours-long examinations — including an ultrasound of the heart and magnetic resonance imaging scans — as used in a long-running study of over 200,000 more people across Germany. That will allow more insight into how players differ from the general population.