??Disease hates exercise

The World Health Organization has released its first-ever Global Status Report on Physical Activity. It's not pretty.

By the numbers:

?? More than one in four adults and 80% of adolescents don’t meet WHO activity guidelines???

?? Depression, type-2 diabetes, heart disease, dementia, breast cancer and colon cancer. All have been linked to inactivity.?

?? Cost to the world economy of illnesses related to inactivity? WHO predicts $300 billion from 2020-2030.

?? Cost of inactivity in lost quality of life? Incalculable.?

Find the physical activity that?you love and stick to it because there are a whole lotta gruesome diseases that hate exercise.

Alzheimer’s hates?exercise?

??The big discovery: Among 250 potential remedies studied, exercise was found to be the best theoretical treatment for Alzheimer’s disease (AD).

What is AD??Alzheimer’s disease is the most common form of dementia, affecting 60-70% of all dementia sufferers. It causes the brain to shrink and brain cells to die with life-diminishing consequences.

How does exercise affect AD??Exercise appears to reverse the expression patterns of genes known to be linked to AD.

What was the research method?that led to this dramatic conclusion? Researchers first created a gene expression portrait of AD. Dozens of genes are associated with Alzheimer’s, but some are more impactful than others. Next, researchers examined 250 potential treatments based on how they altered AD gene expression. Exercise was found to be the best of the 250.

Top quote from the research:

“The potential ability of exercise to reverse AD patterns was striking.”

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Bottom line: Exercise theoretically turns Alzheimer’s off. Alcohol theoretically turns Alzheimer’s on.

Dig a bit deeper?into the research.

But wait, there’s more…

Flu flees exercise?

??Big idea: The more physically active you are, the less likely you are to suffer from seasonal sickness.

Show me?the data: A study that followed over 1,900 people for the three months of the cold and flu season found physical activity to be the #1 lifestyle factor in reducing the likelihood of illness.?People who exercised 5+ days per week were 43% less likely to get sick than those who didn't exercise.

Why? Exercise rallies your immune cells and sends them out to roam the body in search of invaders. Your exercise-fueled immunity patrol kills virus-infected cells on sight.

Bottom line: It doesn’t take much — just a few hours a week of moderate exercise such as brisk walking, cycling, dancing, intense yard working is enough to set your immune patrol in motion.

Get charged up?on boosting your immunity with “How to boost your immunity during cold and flu season,” from?The New York Times.

Do It Now:?Try Kelly McGonigal’s joy workout.?

If you need a nudge: Here’s “How to move your body when your brain won’t cooperate.”

??The Guardian’s Emma Beddington tried the joy workout, but found childlike glee and the sense that being alive is amazing on a bicycle.

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???Recharge Your Wellbeing With These:

???? ?? Walking when the weather is bad is surprisingly good for you. (Bonus points for walking backward.)

?? Dr. Laurie Santos of The Happiness Lab dives into the hot-cold empathy gap — how we can’t understand hot emotions like fear, anger, or exhaustion unless we are actually in the midst of those intense emotions.?

?? “Seek out what magnifies your spirit” is among the 16 life-lessons from Maria Popova’s 16 years of philosophical writing.?

?? Tune into birdsong. Seeing or hearing birds can improve your mental health. (However being surrounded by the tweetsong of Twitter is not good for your mental health.)

?? Catch up on the latest research into what truly makes people happy with happiness rock star Sonja Lyubomirsky who gives us the recharge quote of the week.???

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The Recharge Quote of the Week from Sonja Lyubomirsky via The Psychology Podcast.