WARNING: the World Cup can be bad for your health. During important games, heart attack rates increase dramatically in the countries involved, studies have found.
Medical experts have urged people with heart conditions to take up interests that are less likely to cause their heart rate to fluctuate, such as Japanese flower-arranging, crocheting or watching rugby union.
According to an analysis in the British Medical Journal, the risk of being admitted to an English hospital for acute myocardial infarction increased by 25 per cent on June 30, 1998, US website Miller-McCune reported last week.
Acute myocardial infarction is, of course, a technical term for a heart attack: acute, meaning it really hurts; myocardial, meaning my heart; and infarction being the curse that Englishmen utter while clutching their chests in agony. The full Latin name is, of course, acute myocardial "infarction hell, I'm in bloody agony here", but let's not get too technical.
June 30, 1998, was the day England lost to Argentina in a penalty shoot-out. As opposed to the days England lost to Germany in penalty shoot-outs, the days they lost to Portugal in penalty shoot-outs and the particularly demoralising occasion when they lost to the Little Gigglewick Under-6s in a penalty shoot-out. (They're incredibly mentally tough, the Little Gigglewickians; it's no wonder the Englishmen crumbled.)
In fact, sources close to the project say analysing the data proved particularly troublesome for researchers due to the difficulty of finding a day when England hadn't lost a penalty shoot-out to someone.
Nonetheless, the research was concluded and found that the increase in heart attack hospital admissions continued for two days after the England-Argentina match had finished. This suggests that the penalty shoot-out system for deciding drawn matches is not only cruel and excessively stressful but may need some simplifying: some people took a long time to work out who had won.
Heart attack isn't the only health risk that World Cup watchers face. Lack of sleep can make viewers dangerously run down, leaving them physically vulnerable to colds and man-flus, and mentally vulnerable to the advertising hoardings that surround World Cup pitches.
This may lead to large and unnecessary purchases of Budweiser, McDonald's and Coca-Cola: a potentially lethal cocktail that can lead to acute myocardial "infarction hell, why did I say yes to the super size meal?"
The fans' trumpets known as vuvuzelas also pose a health risk, experts have warned. The Hear the World foundation has measured the vuvuzela at 127 decibels, making it louder than a lawnmower, chainsaw or air horn, The Wall Street Journalreported last week.
Multiply that by the number of fans in a stadium and you have the sound of 50,000 lawnmowers, making a South African stadium a bit like Mosman on a Sunday morning: a haunting proposition for all but the most devoted football fan.
Vuvuzelas can also spread colds, doctors have warned, raising the prospect that games during the second half of the tournament might be accompanied by the sound of 50,000 people coughing, sneezing and clearing their tickly throats.
Whether or not this would be an improvement is a matter that divides football fans. The vuvuzelas bug people – literally. They sound like swarming insects because people in the crowd are blowing the instrument at different times and with slightly varying frequencies, causing the sound to wax and wane, New Scientistreports.
Broadcasters have increased audio filters to reduce the noise. For people watching on computers, the Centre for Digital Music at the Queen Mary University of London has designed software that can muffle the vuvuzelas while keeping the commentary intact.
However, anyone who finds the sound of trumpets that annoying should probably steer clear of watching football altogether: if you're highly strung the next sound you hear may be the incredibly infuriating beep-beep of a heart monitor unit in intensive care. You'll hate listening to it but you won't want it to stop; it'll be torture.
The findings of the heart attack study in the BMJ were backed up by studies in Switzerland during the 2002 World Cup and Munich during the 2006 World Cup. Both found elevated heart attack rates during the tournaments.
The exception to the rule was a study conducted in France during the 1998 World Cup final, in which France beat Brazil, watched by 40 per cent of the French population. A "significantly lower" heart attack rate was recorded that day compared with five days before or after.
This may well have been because France won and a winning team doesn't cause as much heartache as a losing one. Australian hospitals are on high alert.
In other news . .
The NSW Blues are said to be considering a change of kit after their mauling at the hands of Queensland last week.
The Blues were thrashed 34-6 in the second game of the series in Brisbane on Wednesday, with commentators noting that they looked sluggish compared with the slick and nimble Maroons.
A source close to the Blues camp said the players didn't want to make excuses but having to wear long white cloaks and pointy white hats didn't help their performance.
Photo: Reuters