Dr Anbarasu's Dairy - Sitting is the new Smoking

 Sitting is the new Smoking

An alien visiting our planet would be perplexed by modern human life, not leastour relationship with physical exertion. After 6 million years of hunter-gatherer existence, humans can be observed sheltering in warm rooms, counteracting the tiresome effects of earth’s gravity by slouching on comfortable seats in front of glowing screens, being whisked effortlessly between floors aboard mechanical staircases, even soaring across continents while seated in warm moving boxes. All these comforts have happened only in the last half a century.

Humans are built to stand errect. Our heart and cardiovascular system works perfectly that way.  Our bowel functions well in errect posture. It's common to find patients bed ridden to have severe constipation. When you are physically active, your overall energy level and endurance improves and the bones maintain strength. 

Perils of sitting for long:

Sitting long hours can cause wasting of the thick leg and gluteal muscles. When these muscles are weak, especially when one gets old, when we get osteoporosis (which is quite common in our female population) we tend to injure ourselves when we fall and from strains when we exert ourselves. 

Prolonged sitting leads to obesity. But the list of problems does not stop short there. Apart from heart diseases, prolonged siting can cause back pain, colonic cancers, deep vein thrombosis, brittle  bones, depression and even dementia. An average Brit spends 8.4 hours in the chair every day. Certain professions like IT professionals, secretaries and system operators do spend most of their work time on the chair. 

Long hours on the chair tends to rise the blood sugar and blood pressure levels. Sitting too long tends to slow our metabolism and the way Lipoprotein lipase works to break down our fat. Small amounts of standing and moving around during work tends to reverse these hikes. 

It's pretty difficulty to convince people of the perils of prolonged sitting. In a study from Norway, it's been proved that professional who have a prolonged sitting jobs have a very unhealthy eating habit too. We are quite aware that people who spend long hours in front of the Television end up eating quite a lot and unhealthy too.

Need of the hour:

The need of the hour is to campaign for a "Back to your feet". The human race has never been used upto sitting such long hours but for the last few decades. Up until recently, we spent most of our time moving around. What evolution has taken millions of years to bring about, we're trying to undo in a hand full of decades. 

A UK study from 1950s shows us the stark difference of 1.5 times more risk in drivers who spend all the time sitting behind the wheel compared to conductors who spend most of the time standing. Not even moving around, just standing makes a lot of difference. Getting people on their feet would tremendously reduce the incidence of back pain that's caused by prolonged sitting... in a poor posture. 

If increasing activities could be bottled and sold, people would buy it. But it doesn't work that way. Just standing for three or four hours a day through out the year would work out equivalent to doing 10 marathons in a year. 

Spending time standing in-between work just improves the over all mood. People who stand and move around a bit in-between work tend to be happier and prove to be more productive too. In Scandinavian countries, people have the right to a standing desk at work. This proves to be a solution the their back pain. 

Breaking the Cycle:

Taking a break every 30-60 minutes.

Schedule your breaks to move around.

Stand while you work.

Make a stroll each time you pick up your mobile for a call.

Use the stairs for climbing up or down for one or two floors.

This article aims at the IT professionals of our age. Especially after the COVID, where the work from home culture turned out rampant, we see a lot more of IT professions consulting us for high blood sugars, high blood pressure and obesity. It's not infrequent that we see quite young people coming in with heart attacks. 

It's time we break the new rule. Let's look for a healthy break.