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The authors prospectively assessed cardiovascular events that occurred in the greater Munich area during the World Cup in 2006. They compared events on days of matches involving the German team and on other match days with events during various nonmatch times (the control period).
On the days of the German matches, the incidence of cardiac emergencies was 2.66 times that during the control period (3.26 for men and 1.82 for women). The prevalence of known coronary heart disease was 47% among people with cardiac events during German matches, compared with 29% for those who had events during the control period. Based on electrocardiographic changes and enzyme levels, the authors inferred that on the days of the German matches there were increas…