Staying seated is not worse for health than smoking

Some healthy lifestyle messages, such as "sitting for a long time, it's like the new cigarette," are not being broadcast because they're real, but because they're are attractive and easy to tweet. And when a new health alert is promoted, comparisons are always useful for triggering alarms.

"Staying seated is more dangerous than smoking, killing more people than HIV and being more dangerous than skydiving until you die," said a Los Angeles Times expert.

This is an excellent date to show concerned family members if they want to parachute, but otherwise, this kind of thing may seem pointless to want to wear a style. of a healthy life. In other words, you worked hard to quit smoking and discover that your office chair would kill you.

Matt Buman, a health researcher at Arizona State University, said that he and his colleagues had decided to try it. Test the phrase "sitting for a long time is like a new cigarette". He said he agreed with the evidence that sitting too long is a health risk.

Studies have shown that people who spend more time sitting are more likely to die prematurely because of chronic illness than people who spend less time sitting. But staying still is really as bad or worse than smoking?

"We reviewed the literature and compared the effects of sitting on various medical outcomes, including early cardiovascular death, diabetes, and some types of cancer, and compared the effect of smoking," he said. said. "Smoking is much worse." They published their findings in the American Journal of Public Health.

People who promote the still-rest alert may have used other statistics, but it's fair to say that there is no consensus scientist on the fact that sitting is worse than smoking. The message was not a media invention, said Buman, but it came from researchers who were trying to educate the public.

Awareness is good, but exaggerating an alarm will only end the attention or mistrust of scientists.

Everyone sits and everyone dies, and discovering the cause-and-effect link that exists between them is not a trivial matter. There is a body of evidence showing the benefits of exercise and the disadvantages of sedentary living. And there is reason to believe that for those of us who have office work, it is beneficial to get up from time to time, unless it is to go out to smoke.