FRAMINGHAM, Mass.  Scientists at the National Institute of Occupational Health today released findings showing that sports team mascots live shortened lives due to adverse working conditions.

The longitudinal research, which tracked two generations of high school, college and pro mascots, revealed that individuals who don tiger, bulldog and other animal outfits to entertain spectators at sporting events have a shorter life expectancy than non-mascots.

Dennis Radik, a mascot for the Seekonk, Mass. Quahogs, a minor league affiliate of the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, said the research confirmed his experience.  "It gets hot in those outfits and you get dehydrated.  Plus the fans think they can just haul off and belt you."  A quahog is a thick-shelled clam, but Radik's costume consists only of a thin layer of foam rubber stretched over a chicken-wire frame.

Dr. Evan Steinberg, a veterinary epidemiologist, said that the team of scientists who worked on the study developed a precise calculus for determining the effect that life as a mascot has on a person's longevity. 

"We found that feline mascots--lions, tigers, jaguars, wildcats--could expect their lives to be measured in cat years," he said.  "Canine mascots--bulldogs and terriers--you project their life spans in dog years."

Steinberg ran the numbers to show that a 20-year old Georgetown student who wore that school's forty-pound bulldog costume over the course of a Big East basketball season would be considered 141 years old in dog mascot years.  An LSU student of the same age who dressed as that team's tiger totem would be 107 in cat mascot years.

"We have to educate kids that putting on that big fuzzy outfit is a real risk," Steinberg said.  "Being a mascot is as dangerous as smoking, driving without a seatbelt, or calling an escort service."

Copyright 2006, Con Chapman