DOES an activity have to get you out of breath to count as exercise? Do you really have to do half-an-hour a day? Is pumping iron a good way to keep your heart healthy? These are just some of the dilemmas many of us face when working out the best way to get fit. The good news is scientists do broadly agree on the best ways to get fit, they just haven鈥檛 been very good at telling us what they鈥檝e discovered.
鈥淲e haven鈥檛 done a great job of distilling down a large number of studies and say what this means for the average person who鈥檚 trying to get in shape,鈥� acknowledges , a specialist in exercise and sports psychology at San Diego State University in California.
Whether because of a lack of information, or because some of us are just plain lazy, most of us don鈥檛 do enough exercise. One recent survey in the UK found that only a third of adults meet the recommended goals for physical activity.
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Though we all know that exercise is a good thing, only recently was the extent of its influence on our health established. In the early 20th century, heart attacks were growing steadily more common in the west, and they were seen as a sinister new epidemic. It is now thought there are several explanations for this, ranging from a fall in infectious diseases enabling heart attacks to take the lead, to various changes in society that made lifestyles less healthy.
A key insight into the importance of lifestyle came from a 1953 study of London bus conductors. At the time, London buses not only had a driver but also a conductor, who sold tickets to passengers after they had boarded and sat down. Most of the buses were double-deckers, so the conductors spent a lot of their day walking up and down the stairs.
The landmark study published in The Lancet () showed that conductors suffered half as many heart attacks as their driver colleagues. 鈥淚t was the first hint that this new frightening epidemic could be linked to the way we live,鈥� said , at the time an epidemiologist at the UK鈥檚 Medical Research Council, who led the study.
Since Morris鈥檚 study, hundreds of other investigations have confirmed the benefits of exercise on the heart and circulation, as well as on almost every other system of the body. Diseases that are prevented by exercise include stroke, cancer, diabetes, liver and kidney disease, osteoporosis and even brain diseases such as dementia and depression.
So how should you go about getting fit? Over the next nine articles, we have set out the latest evidence and exploded some myths along the way. Read on, and you can decide for yourself.
How do you know if you鈥檙e getting fit?
Is pumping iron really necessary?
Is getting fit easier for some people?
Do you need to 鈥榩ush fluids鈥�?
Editorial: Only the big picture of health will do
