Health Effects
A lack of physical activity is one of the leading causes of preventable death worldwide.
Sitting still may cause premature death. The risk is higher among those that sit still more than 4 hours per day. It is shown to be a risk factor on its own independent of hard exercise and BMI. The more still, the higher risk of chronic diseases. People that sit still more than 11 hours per day have a 40 percent higher risk than those that sit fewer than 4 hours per day. However those that exercise at least 5 hours per week are as healthy as those that sit fewer than 4 hours per day.
A sedentary lifestyle and lack of physical activity can contribute to or be a risk factor for:
- Anxiety
- Cardiovascular disease
- Mortality in elderly men by 30% and double the risk in elderly women
- Deep vein thrombosis
- Depression
- Diabetes
- Colon cancer
- High blood pressure
- Obesity
- Osteoporosis
- Lipid disorders
- Kidney stones
Read more about this topic: Sedentary Lifestyle
Famous quotes containing the words health and/or effects:
“All climates agree with brave Chanticleer. He is more indigenous even than the natives. His health is ever good, his lungs are sound, his spirits never flag.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“The hippie is the scion of surplus value. The dropout can only claim sanctity in a society which offers something to be dropped out of—career, ambition, conspicuous consumption. The effects of hippie sanctimony can only be felt in the context of others who plunder his lifestyle for what they find good or profitable, a process known as rip-off by the hippie, who will not see how savagely he has pillaged intricate and demanding civilizations for his own parodic lifestyle.”
—Germaine Greer (b. 1939)