French adults spend an average of twelve hours a day sitting on weekdays. Two doctors share their advice on how to protect yourself from the harmful effects of a sedentary lifestyle.
Sedentarity, or the total amount of time spent sitting, not moving, from the time you wake up until you go to sleep, is a bombshell in terms of health consequences. According to the National Observatory of Physical Activity and Sedentary Life (Onaps) in France, French adults spend an average of twelve hours a day sitting on weekdays and nine hours on non-weekdays. Breaking this state of immobility is important to protect against risks, says general practitioner, health sports promoter and member of the Ministry of Health commission Alexander Felts.
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Get up once an hour
There is nothing simpler to compensate for this sedentary lifestyle. According to the doctor, who is also the author of the book, you only need to get up once an hour and walk around for one to five minutes. Prescription Health Sports, a Movement Manifesto (1). However, it is pointless to be limited by this rule, he clarifies. “Even moving for 20 seconds already reduces the health risks of a sedentary lifestyle.”
The dangers are really many, because the human body is not designed to stay still. A sedentary lifestyle increases the risk of obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure, cancer, cardiovascular disease and thereby increases the risk of mortality. And the longer we stand still, the greater the risk. “Eight hours a day sitting increases these risks by 28%, nine hours of sedentary life increases them by 48%,” warns Martin Duclos, head of the sports medicine department at Clermont-Ferrand University Hospital and president of Onaps. Good to know. the risks remain the same if you practice regular physical activity at the same time, because it is not enough to balance such a stable immobile state.
Contract the leg muscles
As for the type of movements to be performed, the choice is up to each individual. A trip down the stairs, a phone call while walking, or a trip to the photocopier… All occasions are good for moving.
If the legs are still, the blood flow is low and does not stimulate the walls of the arteries
Martin Duclos, Head of Sports Medicine at Clermont-Ferrand University Hospital
The main thing is to contract the leg muscles, claims Martin Duclos. Indeed, physical inactivity of the lower extremities alters the very mechanism of bodily and cognitive cells. If the legs are still, the blood flow is low and does not stimulate the arterial walls, “this prevents the production of anti-clotting and anti-inflammatory hormones, continues the doctor. In addition, the muscles can no longer do their job as a “sensor” for cholesterol and glucose, so the latter will be stored around vital organs such as the pancreas or the heart, thus promoting cardiovascular disease.
Outside of these active breaks, placing a treadmill under our desk or sitting on a Swiss ball can be a good solution to reducing our sedentary score. Dr. Alexander Felts also invites you to transform the “restricted route” into a “health route”, for example, by using the commute home from work, cycling or walking. The main effort, argues Martin Duclos, who concludes: “It’s up to us to change our lifestyle because our bodies won’t adapt.”
(1) Prescription Health Sports, a Movement ManifestoAlexander Felts, (Éd. Des Equateurs), 176 pages, €17.
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Source: Le Figaro
