Exercise is a struggle when you have been dealing with the progression of m.s. for a number of years. Pain is one problem and inertia is another. Whatever the barriers exercise of some kind needs to be made a part of our routine. .
Comfy chairs are killing us very softly
It's time we did something about the dangers of sitting
By Andrew Coyne, edmontonjournal.com July 21, 2012
This week the British medical journal The Lancet published a new series of studies on the health consequences of physical inactivity. The figures are staggering. They show physical inactivity is responsible for as much as 10 per cent of the "burden of disease" (years of life lost to mortality or disability) from illnesses as diverse as colon cancer, Type 2 diabetes and coronary heart disease.
All told, physical inactivity is now the fourth-leading cause of death around the world. More than 5.3 million people die of it every year, accounting for nearly one death in 10. That's more than die from smoking. It's more than die from all injuries combined (traffic accidents claim 1.2 million lives annually).
We should be clear what we are really talking about here. It isn't some vague condition called inactivity that is killing people. It is the specific activity of sitting, which is how most of us spend most of our days.
The usual prescription for inactivity is more exercise, which certainly can't hurt.
But a 15-to-30 minute daily walk, as The Lancet advises, is of little benefit if you are sitting for six to eight hours a day at work, plus another three to four hours outside it - with a half-hour commute each way in between.
That's not just my opinion. A growing body of evidence shows the cumulative effects of all that sitting are not easily remediable by exercise.
For example, a 2010 study of more than 100,000 adults in the American Journal of Epidemiology found those who sat for more than six hours a day were more likely to die than those who sat for less than three, even if the former exercised regularly and the latter did no exercise at all.
An earlier study of 17,000 Canadians ("Sitting time and mortality from all causes, cardiovascular disease, and cancer") found much the same.
In short, sitting kills.
The chair you're in is a machine for producing human fat. Sitting slows the metabolism, inhibiting the creation of lipoprotein lipase, an enzyme the body uses to break down fats.
In the same way, sugars are less easily processed. Moreover, slower blood flows increase the risks of clots forming, especially in the legs.
Like smoking, sitting demonstrably increases your risks, not only of death, but of serious illness, and like smoking, the risks compound over time.
We were not meant to work like this. Primitive man was more or less constantly on the move, hunting and foraging. Even as late as the 20th century, most people worked in jobs that required substantial amounts of physical labour.
If we were serious about public health, what should we do?
Read More @ The Edmonton Journal
Link:
Op Ed: Comfy chairs are killing us very softly
Comfy chairs are killing us very softly
It's time we did something about the dangers of sitting
By Andrew Coyne, edmontonjournal.com July 21, 2012
This week the British medical journal The Lancet published a new series of studies on the health consequences of physical inactivity. The figures are staggering. They show physical inactivity is responsible for as much as 10 per cent of the "burden of disease" (years of life lost to mortality or disability) from illnesses as diverse as colon cancer, Type 2 diabetes and coronary heart disease.
All told, physical inactivity is now the fourth-leading cause of death around the world. More than 5.3 million people die of it every year, accounting for nearly one death in 10. That's more than die from smoking. It's more than die from all injuries combined (traffic accidents claim 1.2 million lives annually).
We should be clear what we are really talking about here. It isn't some vague condition called inactivity that is killing people. It is the specific activity of sitting, which is how most of us spend most of our days.
The usual prescription for inactivity is more exercise, which certainly can't hurt.
But a 15-to-30 minute daily walk, as The Lancet advises, is of little benefit if you are sitting for six to eight hours a day at work, plus another three to four hours outside it - with a half-hour commute each way in between.
That's not just my opinion. A growing body of evidence shows the cumulative effects of all that sitting are not easily remediable by exercise.
For example, a 2010 study of more than 100,000 adults in the American Journal of Epidemiology found those who sat for more than six hours a day were more likely to die than those who sat for less than three, even if the former exercised regularly and the latter did no exercise at all.
An earlier study of 17,000 Canadians ("Sitting time and mortality from all causes, cardiovascular disease, and cancer") found much the same.
In short, sitting kills.
The chair you're in is a machine for producing human fat. Sitting slows the metabolism, inhibiting the creation of lipoprotein lipase, an enzyme the body uses to break down fats.
In the same way, sugars are less easily processed. Moreover, slower blood flows increase the risks of clots forming, especially in the legs.
Like smoking, sitting demonstrably increases your risks, not only of death, but of serious illness, and like smoking, the risks compound over time.
We were not meant to work like this. Primitive man was more or less constantly on the move, hunting and foraging. Even as late as the 20th century, most people worked in jobs that required substantial amounts of physical labour.
If we were serious about public health, what should we do?
Read More @ The Edmonton Journal
Link:
Op Ed: Comfy chairs are killing us very softly
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