Update: Mercury on the Mind

Industrial refinery at sunset with a yellow danger sign warning of mercury area and hazardous chemicals

Mercury is a potent neurotoxin. It is particularly dangerous for pregnant women and young children. As a 2018 TBI on the Hill piece noted, mercury exposure “may delay developmental milestones” in fetuses and children, and acute poisoning can bring tremors, slurred speech, and hallucinations.

The EPA finalized the 2012 Mercury and Air Toxics Standards, targeting coal- and oil-fired power plants. In 2024, these standards were tightened by Congress. Supporters of this heightening of standards argued that the tighter limits reduced toxic exposures tied to neurological harm. Critics countered that by 2021 mercury emissions were already down 90% from pre-2012 levels, and the 2024 update’s compliance costs outweighed its measurable benefits.

In February 2026, the EPA repealed the 2024 update, reverting to 2012 standards. In turn, on April 27, 2026, Senator Whitehouse (RI) introduced S.J.188 to reinstate 2024 standards, which would nullify the presidential proclamation from earlier this year. When the Act went to the Senate floor on June 3, 2026, the resolution failed 46-53, with voting falling in party lines, as they considered (1) Did the 2024 rule cause unnecessary economic stress on the industry, costs that are then passed on to the consumer”, and/or (2) Are the brain-protective regulations too great for the government to ignore?

A Dangerous TBI Two-Way Street

A traumatic brain injury doesn’t just raise your risk of later neurological disorders; preexisting neurological disorders may raise the risk of brain injury, concludes a recent 2026 study from the San Francisco Veterans Affairs Health Care System.

Diagram showing circular relationship between brain injury and epilepsy with arrows indicating feedback loop and mutual exacerbation of seizures and brain damage

Published June 17, 2026. in the journal Neurology, the Department of Defense-supported study tracked more than 55,000 older veterans. Scientists found that traumatic brain injury was tied to higher rates of stroke, dementia, epilepsy, and Parkinson’s disease both before and after the injury. “Our findings raise the possibility that… [pre-existing brain diseases] are themselves risk factors for TBI in older people,” said study author Carrie Peltz, PhD, of the San Francisco Veterans Affairs Health Care System.

In the year before a TBI, older veterans were about three times more likely to have been diagnosed with stroke, dementia, or Parkinson’s and more than four times more likely to have epilepsy. After a TBI, they were roughly twice as likely to have a stroke or epilepsy. This results greatly build on an Oxford Academic, PubMed-accessible, 2025 study that found, “Among those with TBI, patients with pre-injury dementia had particularly high chronic mortality.” While causality has not firmly been medically defined, the study’s results are clear.

Women With Brain Injuries Less Likely to Reach Trauma Centers – But the Full Picture Matters

Male patient with head injury eating with visitor and female patient with head injury writing

A major new study published June 15, 2026, in the Canadian Medical Association Journal (CMAJ), and found in the PubMed database, reveals a striking inequity: women hospitalized with traumatic brain injury (TBI) in Ontario are significantly less likely than men to be admitted to specialized (Level I or II) trauma centers. After adjusting for age, injury severity, comorbidities, and income, women’s odds for prompt treatment remain 26% lower (OR 0.74) than that of men.

The finding echoes earlier work: a 2022 US study found that female trauma patients, including those with TBI, experienced longer delays to reach trauma care than men even after accounting for injury severity and type. An accompanying editorial was pointedly titled “Sex Disparities in Trauma Care -Why Are the Women Waiting?” Other U.S. research similarly documents women being undertriaged in emergency departments despite comparable injuries.

Yet context is essential. Per CDC data reported in 2018 and 2020, males were nearly two times more likely to be hospitalized for a TBI (79.9 age-adjusted rate versus 43.7) and three times more likely to die from one than females (28.3 versus 8.4). Even in the Ontario study, men had more severe head trauma (33% vs 25%). The disparity in care is real and demands attention, but men remain more likely to sustain, and die from, TBI overall.

President Jackson’s Badge of Freedom

Portrait of a 19th-century man in black suit holding a sword with U.S. Capitol visible through window

Long before he became the seventh president, 13-year-old Andrew Jackson was a prisoner of war. As the U.S. last president to have served in the Revolutionary War, he and his brother were captured during the British invasion of the Carolina backcountry in 1781. Jackson was then ordered to clean a British officer’s boots. When he refused, the officer answered with a saber, slashing Jackson’s hand and head.

Revolutionary War soldiers in Carolina backcountry 1781

The wound never fully left him. Reports from his friends later stated that they could lay a finger in the dent it left in his skull. In fact, he wore this scar as a badge of freedom rather than a mark of defeat. Historians have long debated what role that early head trauma may have played in the headaches and volatile temperament that shadowed him for life, though no clinical record can say for certain.

This July 4, The Museum of the Waxhaw, in Waxhaw, NC, steps from young Jackson’s refusal, and the resulting wound, honors this moment in American history with a reading of the Declaration of Independence.

FY27 Defense Bill Takes Aim at Military Brain Injuries

Stacks of defense budget documents laid out on a table with the U.S. Capitol building in the background at dusk

The Fiscal Year 2027 National Defense Appropriations Act advances several significant provisions for service members living with traumatic brain injury, moving through both chambers of Congress with bipartisan momentum this June.

The Senate Armed Services Committee approved S. 4784 on June 10 after a three-day markup. The bill includes a provision “requiring the Secretary of Defense to provide a briefing on the feasibility of regular cognitive testing and establishing blast overpressure and TBI logs, and encouraging DoD to approach brain health, blast overpressure exposure tracking, and suicide risk analysis as force health protection.” Additionally, it includes “the provision of training to the armed forces of partner nations in the Indo-Pacific and Arctic regions in the following areas: (A) Health effects and medical response related to chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and explosive weapons, (B) Trauma care, (C) Preventive medicine and infectious disease, (D) Post-traumatic stress disorder, (E) Suicide prevention, (F) Traumatic brain injury, (G) Medical and health intelligence, (H) Health policy and administration.”

The House version, H.R. 8800, passed committee 44-12 and includes a section that would create a working group to develop an AI-driven digital strategy for treating brain injuries, and $7.5 million for a Cognitive Performance Enhancement Program for Special Operations Forces. H.R. 8800 has not yet received a floor vote.

The Biggest Veterans Bill in Years Buries a Tinnitus Trap

U.S. flag waving with Capitol building and two military personnel silhouette, text about Veterans Act 2026

House Veterans’ Affairs Chairman Mike Bost (IL) and Senate Veterans’ Affairs Chairman Jerry Moran (KS) introduced the Take Care of America’s Veterans Act (H.R. 9237/S. 4744) on June 10, 2026. This new 554-page, 62-page bill includes many sections that affect the brain injured from multiple angles:

Led by Rep. Jack Bergman (MI), a retired Marine general, and Rep. Sarah Elfreth (MD), the BEACON Act provision authorizes roughly $60 million for VA grants targeting non-pharmacological treatments for mild-to-moderate TBI. The Precision Brain Health Research Act, championed by Sen. Jerry Moran and Sen. Angus King (ME), directs a 10-year VA research plan on repetitive low-level blast injuries. The bill’s TBI provision includes A Blast Overpressure Task Force and HBOT reporting requirement, from Rep. Gregory Murphy (NC). A catastrophic-disability supplement of $833/month would benefit many severe TBI cases.

Furthermore, the package includes the Major Richard Star Act, the Love Lives On Act, and the Veterans’ ACCESS Act, among others. Rep. Gus Bilirakis (FL), a Congressional Brain Injury Task Force member, is among 20 House cosponsors; Senate cosponsors are John Boozman (AR) and Kevin Cramer (ND).

While the bill may appear wholly beneficial, it’s controversial because it offsets costs by reclassifying tinnitus – often a TBI symptom – as a derivative condition. (A derivative condition refers to a medical, legal, or mathematical situation that results directly from a pre-existing or primary cause.) This new classification would eliminate its standalone VA rating and data shows that it could potentially cut $57 billion in benefits for 1.5 million veterans.

Tackles and Trauma: As Rugby Booms Among U.S. Kids, Brain Science Sounds the Alarm

Major League Rugby logo with player running holding rugby ball

This past weekend’s Major League Rugby Championship underscored rugby’s arrival in Illinois. With over 50,000 youth registrations in 2024 and more than 370,000 children introduced to the sport through outreach programs in 21 states, the game is one of the fastest-growing youth sports in the country.

For those who have already sustained a brain injury, structured aerobic activity, like the non-contact formats of tag and flag rugby, offer genuine therapeutic benefit. The sport’s emphasis on teamwork and communication also supports psychosocial recovery, reducing isolation among those navigating long-term concussion symptoms.

Irish rugby player O'Sullivan holding ball and scoring while tackled by a Scottish player in muddy conditions

Yet the neuroscience demands caution. A 2023 study in Acta Neuropathologica found CTE in 68% of donated former-rugby brains, with risk rising 14% per additional year of play. A 2023 NIH-backed study in JAMA Neurology found CTE in 41% of contact-sport athletes under 30. The CDC estimates up to 3.8 million sports concussions annually. Sen. Maggie Hassan (NH) has called for action, stating that “the full scope of these injuries often goes unrecognized.”

VA’s MDMA Trial Offers New Hope, Particularly for the Brain Injured

On May 26, 2026, the VA announced a clinical trial to test MDMA-assisted therapy for veterans battling PTSD and alcohol use disorder. The study, which began enrollment quietly on May 18, is one of 19 psychedelic trials the VA is funding through $23 million in external grants, enrolling approximately 80 veterans at facilities in Providence, Rhode Island, and West Haven, Connecticut, with results expected in May 2030.

The trial will study the safety and effectiveness of MDMA-assisted therapy to address conditions that do not fully respond to standard treatments. For those living with traumatic brain injury, the treatment’s benefit may be significant. Research shows that patients with head injuries are more likely to develop PTSD than those without a TBI history. Studies confirm that veterans with probable TBI have 1.72 times greater odds of developing PTSD.

“This trial represents an important step in safely evaluating new approaches and innovations to treat Veterans with severe mental health conditions,” said VA Secretary Doug Collins. For the hundreds of thousands of veterans carrying both a damaged brain and a traumatized mind, it may represent something even more profound: a second chance at healing.

NJ Lawmakers Push Bill to Catch Brain Injuries Before They Become Criminal Records

Nearly one in five incarcerated adolescents have a clinically significant brain injury. Most, however, are never diagnosed. New Jersey lawmakers want to change that.

Assembly bill A5104 (introduced May 18, 2026) and its Senate companion S4112 (introduced May 4, 2026) would establish a Brain Injury Screening and Education Program within the Department of Children and Families, targeting children and specific young adults ages 5 to 21, who are in or at risk of entering the mental-health or juvenile-justice systems. The program would deploy validated screening tools, train judges, educators, law enforcement, and facility staff, and fund public outreach on the link between undiagnosed brain injury and delinquency. As stated in the bill’s text, the goal is to “prevent admissions to psychiatric hospitals and reduce the recidivism rates of juveniles adjudicated delinquent.”

Committee hearing on Juvenile Brain Injury Bill in State House chamber with legislators reviewing documents

Prime sponsor Assemblyman Sterley Stanley is joined in the Senate by Patrick Diegnan, whose history of support for the brain injury committee includes championing New Jersey’s 2010 student-athlete concussion law and earning the Brain Injury Alliance’s Brady Award for Public Service in 2019. Bipartisan Senate co-sponsors are Angela McKnight and Owen Henry.

As of June 2026, no other state has enacted a comparable statutory youth program, making New Jersey a potential national first.

Another Study Links TBI & PTSD to Cognitive Decline – But Not Through Brain Plaques

A study published May 30, 2026, in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease is reshaping how researchers understand cognitive decline in combat veterans. Using data from the Department of Defense’s Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative, USC researchers examined how TBI and PTSD affect brain imaging markers and cognition in a U.S. veteran population.

Brain imaging results and cognitive test data assessing memory and executive function in veterans

The study found that greater PTSD symptom severity was linked to poorer performance across all three cognitive tests used, and higher TBI severity correlated with lower scores on the Mini-Mental State Examination. What is striking about these findings is that they did not show that TBI severity nor PTSD symptoms were associated with neuroimaging biomarkers of neurodegeneration or vascular damage.

This discovery suggests that cognitive impairment in veterans may not stem directly from the accumulation of Alzheimer’s pathologies or vascular injuries. This matters enormously for treatment. It suggests veterans’ cognitive struggles may require targeted interventions beyond standard dementia pathways – a finding directly relevant to legislative reauthorizing of funding for federal TBI surveillance and research programs.