Yikes! Very sorry to hear this. I hadn't known about it.
I checked out a wikipedia article on "Artificial turf-cancer hypothesis" [url]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_turf–cancer_hypothesis[/url] and found this information:
A 2019 Yale study showed that there were 306 chemicals in crumb rubber and that 52 of these chemicals were classified as carcinogens by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). They stated that "a vacuum in our knowledge about the carcinogenic properties of many crumb rubber infill. The crumb rubber infill of artificial turf fields contains or emits chemicals that can affect human physiology."[6]
A 2021 study published in Science of the Total Environment analyzed the composition of synthetic turf football pitches from 17 countries. It confirmed the presence of "hazardous substances in the recycled crumb rubber samples collected all around the world" including PAHs of high and very high concern. The study concluded that different stakeholders "must work on a consensus to protect not only human health but also the environment, since there is evidence that crumb rubber hazardous chemicals can reach the environment and affect wildlife." [7]
In March of 2023, investigative reporters from the Philadelphia Inquirer bought souvenir samples of the old Veterans Stadium artificial turf and commissioned diagnostics through the Eurofins Environmental Testing laboratory. The resulting lab report linked per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) to the turf. Six former Philadelphia Phillies who played at Veterans Stadium, home to the team from 1971 to 2003, died from glioblastoma, an aggressive brain cancer: Tug McGraw, Darren Daulton, John Vukovich, John Oates, Ken Brett, and David West.[8]
That last item is obviously the
Inquirer article cited by chaberial.
This would seem to imply that playing on plastic grass, hour after hour, day after day in the broiling sun might have negative health effects. Who could have guessed?
BTW, the wiki article cites another observation regarding soccer players on artificial turf:
In 2014, Amy Griffin, soccer coach at the University of Washington, surveyed American players of the sport who had developed cancer. Of 38 players, 34 were goalkeepers, a position in which diving to the surface makes accidental ingestion or blood contact with crumb rubber more likely, Griffin has asserted. Lymphoma and leukemia, cancers of the blood, predominated.[10]
Notably, five of the six of the Phillies who died of glioblastoma were catchers or pitchers. Maybe they all spent an unusual amount of time crouching or finishing their follow through at or near ground level in relation to the turf.