“Sitting is the new Smoking”

Did you know that you burn an average of 50 calories more per hour by just standing ?

” Sitting is the new Smoking”, ” The chair is out to kill”.

These phrases were coined by Dr James Levine , Professor of Medicine at Mayo Clinic.

Numerous articles have been written on the dangers of excessive sitting and how sitting or lying down for too long increases your risk of chronic health problems such as heart disease, diabetes and some cancers.

Sitting for extended periods of time also leads to lower back pain. This is because 90 pct more pressure is applied on that area when you sit.

 

 

Man was meant to move !

Dr Joan Vernikos is a former director of NASA’s Life Sciences Division and the author of the book ” Sitting Kills, Moving Heals – How Everyday movement will prevent pain, illness and early death – and Exercise alone won’t”. In her words ” We were not designed to sit. The human body is a perpetual motion machine”.

In other words exercise alone does not negate the damage that extended periods of sitting leads to. The cure for too much sitting cannot be too much exercise. You cannot offset 7-8 hours of sitting with one hour of exercise.

I recently updated my Instagram handle ” ziptofitness” with this picture.

 

 

Scientists claim that our metabolism slows down by close to 90 percent after we sit for 30 minutes. The muscles in our lower body start turning off.

The chair at work is one of the biggest threats to our health. Researchers today are supporting the claims by Dr Levine and that of standing desks at work. Lots of corporates and institutions today have adopted them in their work environment too.

So what can one do?

If you get up for barely 5 minutes, every half an hour, it keeps your metabolism in check. It’s that simple. For students, for office going people this is very important.

Set an alert on your phone or your fitness band.

Take your phone calls standing or walking.

Instead of using the office phone to speak to a colleague, walk across to talk to them.

Just Move !