Are African footballers more susceptible to heart attacks?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-40260280

The recent death of Ivorian footballer Cheick Tiote on the pitch brought an outpouring of sadness in the world of football. This left us asking if there is any evidence to suggest that African players are more likely to die on the pitch than other players, writes Jordan Dunbar.
In the past few years there have been a number of players who have died while playing football.
Perhaps the most high profile incidents involved two African players; Cameroonian Marc Vivien Foe, who died during a game, and Congolese Fabrice Muamba, who had a cardiac arrest on the pitch but survived.
There is no official register of people who have died playing football. So instead we have used a list from Wikipedia as, though not ideal, it is the most complete we could find.
And we are looking at people who died playing the game, that is either in training or during a match.
Robert Mastrodomenico from Global Sports Statistics has done some calculations to give us a rough estimate.
Restricting himself to the last 10 years he found that 64 footballers had died during that period, but said it was not easy to figure out what all their nationalities were.
This means this list certainly has its limitations, and yet, he persevered to crunch the numbers and we think it still shows something interesting.

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The analysis suggests that 26 of the 64 players who have died in the last 10 years are from African countries. That is nearly 40%.
Fifa, football's world governing body, estimates that there are about 265 million people playing in recognised teams around the world. Around 17% of those are playing in Africa.
That is not an ideal measure as many African players are in leagues in other continents. But it is a useful benchmark.
Therefore, while Africans make up 17% of the world's footballers they account for nearly 40% of the known deaths.
Overall, the biggest cause of death of footballers on the pitch was sudden cardiac death and this was particularly true for African players, as 25 of the 26 died from this cause.
Could African players really be more susceptible to sudden cardiac death?
Professor of cardiology Sanjay Sharma told the BBC that evidence from the US shows that sudden cardiac death amongst black basketball players is around three times more common than for white players.

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But, he added, that is not the only place he has seen that pattern.
"There is data from the National Collegiate Athletic Association in the US that shows that the overall risk of sudden cardiac death during sport is around one in 48,000.
"But when someone actually examines this more closely that risk is considerably higher in black athletes; one in 18,000 in black males."
Professor Sharma said that in the UK the Football Association has done research on young players. The death rate for white footballers in that sample is one in 25,000 but it is one in 4,000 for black players.
In other words, a black player is about six times more likely to die than a white player, though the chances are still very small.

 

Interesting, though speculative.
It seems unlikely that the medical staff are missing anything obvious.
It definitely seems that more research needs to be done on the subject.

 

Thanks for the reply.

 

Well, if you will insist on posting serious threads on the Premier League board...

 

Could be a simpler explanation. Tall people are more susceptible to heart attacks than short people.


I don't know this for a fact, but I suspect that your average African is taller than your average Asian, European or American.

The real factor is very likely height not continent of origin.

 

Seems very ungonzoesque.

 

The Dutch are the tallest on average, IIRC. I think that the Nordic lot come next.
I'd guess that Africans are actually shorter than Europeans on average, honestly.
Doesn't nutrition play into it quite a bit, as well as heredity?

Just found an article that would seem to support that:
https://ourworldindata.org/human-height/

 

I would expect due to there poor upbringing (if they were born in Africa) would lead to heart and body issues.

 

So why is the question not aimed at Europeans that have artery dissolving fat fed to them almost daily from birth?
Poor African people also probably get more exercise than Europeans I'd guess.

 

#racism

 

might not go down to well this but for me it is all about the change..

I'd struggle living in Manila, I was evolved in a Northern England climate. Put tropical fish in a cold water bowl and they struggle and visa versa..

Not saying it is the problem, just an observation, nothing more..

 

I do serious now and then.

 

At least Europeans get nutrients, vitamins, regular water and food. They may be overweight but with Africans if you live in a poverty area you get little to know food or water and the living conditions are poor so when they finally play a professional level and are asking to run 10 km 2 matches a week there must be a issue.

 

I'm waiting for the anti-racism lobby to appear.

 

Conditioning, climate, diet. I'd imagine it could have something to do with the rate at which the body loses water in hotter climates, condition your body to do that regularly and it could have long term cardiovascular issues. I wouldn't ever want to train anaerobically in searing heat, chuck Ramadan on top of that and it's a recipe for disaster.

 

Ramadan and recipes dont go together Tel.

Anyway..im gathering that you are a bit of an Adonis, im just an Addonshit, you can set me up with a Gym and diet routine in the Gym thread whenever you can be arsed, Ramadan finishes next Weekend...hoping to embrace the regime then.

Make me look like Wolverine, Hugh Jackman ****

If i need to buy illegal things..it's cool...i just want the details.

Midlife crisis..gonna smash it.

 

Haha, I'm far from an Adonis mate, I've been in much better shape than I am today, because life (and injuries) has got in the way.

You need to tell me what you want to train for, size, strength or losing chub, that'll tell me where the diet needs to be and that's 90% of the work done.

 

Im not fat to be honest, contrary to popular rumour on here.

I need to tone up, shed about a stone and cut. Not bothered about strength training.

Just want to enhance my magnetism for the pussy, fancy changing my Booty rota.

 

Ok mate, no problemo.

I'll knock something up for you, I'm assuming pork is the only grub off the menu.

 

Cheers Tel very much appreciated and yes mate x