Wednesday, May 11, 2011

Warning: Sitting kills!

All these years as a non-smoker and I never thought I'd unwittingly spend every day of my life doing something almost as dangerous: sitting.

Unless you've been wandering the deserts of Arabia, or on a scientific expedition in Antarctica, in which case this news probably doesn't apply to you anyway, you can't have failed to have heard the latest research findings that warn that those of us with desk jobs have an increased risk of dying. Simply because we sit.

And it doesn't matter how seemingly healthy you are: what you eat, how much you weigh and how much exercise you do matters not a jot. If you sit for extended periods of time you are essentially killing yourself.

And apparently it's worse if you're a woman. (Well it would be, wouldn't it? As if we don't have enough to deal with.) Where men who sit for more than 6 hours a day have an 18% increased risk of dying of sedentary-related diseases, for women that number jumps to 37%! Hardly seems fair.

Perhaps it all relates to evolution. Men would expend a lot of energy hunting, then come home, eat a massive meal, fall asleep and then be essentially useless for a few days until another bison was required. Meanwhile, women were faffing about the cave, running around after small children, gathering leaves and berries, shooing away scavengers and generally being just a little bit busy, constantly. But that is mere speculation. An evolutionary biologist I am not. Although that would be a pretty cool profession.

Admittedly this news isn't really new. Studies on this topic have been conducted over the last few years and they all seem to corroborate the findings. But a recent study by the University of Queensland has some good news: you don't really need to do much to counteract this effect. Spending a minimum of 1 minute standing or walking for every 15 minutes of sitting is enough to keep you healthy.

Luckily for me, I am so full of baby at the moment that I can't comfortably sit still for any period of time anyway. But just in case I might start drinking water from an egg cup so that I'm forced to wander to the water cooler every 15 minutes.

References
  1. MedConnect: Small Breaks From Sitting 'Good For Heart'
  2. Inc.com: Action Tips for Healthy Employees
  3. Daily Mail: Could Sitting Down Be the Death Of You? 
  4. BuzzFeed: Sitting Down WILL Kill You (Infographic)

11 comments:

  1. Nobody can reject the info you have given in the blogs, this is actually a great work.
    WIKI LINKS

    ReplyDelete

  2. نجار ابواب بالرياض نجار بالرياض
    تركيب ستائر بالرياض شركة تركيب ستائر بالرياض
    تنظيف مكيفات بالرياض شركة تنظيف مكيفات بالرياض
    شركة تنظيف افران الغاز بالرياض شركة تنظيف افران بالرياض


    ReplyDelete
  3. These particular scientific studies are the foundation of numerous look for advertising and marketing actions such as pay per click and Search engine optimization http://www.techscrunch.com/2019/04/02/using-experts-for-seo-digital-marketing-in-boston/, website landing page design, and operating a blog. There are several approaches and equipment that are widely used to generate the data found it necessary to make sound keyword advertising choices.

    ReplyDelete
  4. I'd be trampled if all sites gave articles like these awesome articles.
    listleveragereview.net/

    ReplyDelete
  5. Hey nice post man! Thanks for incredible info.
    4life Research Review

    ReplyDelete
  6. For the excellent company you can't pass wrong in any sort of manner while deciding on! To the detailed care user experience design firms deliver in your presence. I wish for the great of success in all of our destiny endeavors

    ReplyDelete
  7. Really amazing blog!!! I enjoyed the complete article? enormous written.
    i was reading this

    ReplyDelete
  8. This written piece gives fastidious understanding yet.It’s amazing in support of me to truly have a web site that is valuable meant for my knowledge
    UX agencies

    ReplyDelete
  9. Thankfulness to my dad who informed me relating to this blog, this website is really amazing.
    Ministry Of Freedom Bonus

    ReplyDelete
  10. Quickly this site will indisputably be famous among all blogging people, because of its fastidious articles or reviews.
    best UX designers

    ReplyDelete