Decline in Physical Activity: Causes and Effects

When a person does an effort and moves his muscles, plainly what he does is physical activity. The fundamental point here, it’s not compulsory for physical activities to be a predetermined sport or hard exercise, they could be your preferable sport, a breezy exercise or just an uncomplicated and ordinary movement easy to do in your daily life. Despite that, concerning our current generation, we are encountering a manifest decline in physical activity. Unlike previous generations where physical activities were something routinely, moreover, they were essential things to complete their day normally. Anyway, this remarkable decline in physical activity has many negative consequences.

A key factor influencing the decline in physical activity includes the development of technology and electronic machines. In antiquity, people must walk long distances only to do their significant tasks, like laundering their clothes near to distant lake because of the lack of development. To be briefly physical activity was a routine for them, more than that it was important for them to continue their day normally. And the result of this hard work, they were had strong bodies without going to the gym. On the other hand, looking at how the machines become advanced, people tend to use them as an alternative of doing it by themselves. For instance, the robotic vacuum is one of the machines that make people stop doing the simplest daily physical activity. I’m not saying that the development is abominable, but we should use it in moderation. Look at yourself, how many machines you depend on instead of doing it manually?

One area in which the decline of physical activity has had an impact is diseases, which may be chronic diseases. Many international researches have confirmed that the decline of physical activity exposes people to diseases including heart disease, diabetes and some types of cancer. Besides, now with the advancement in technology, a lot of new games have emerged and got the interest of children, adults and especially adolescents. Because of that, they sit in front of the screens without any physical activity for hours that may reach 8 hours a day and maybe more. As a result, obesity has spread among them, and we can already notice on social media how more than 50% of people admit that they are spending most of their day in front of video games.

Another consequence of decline physical activity and the most dangerous consequence is premature death. As I mentioned, lack of movement causes diseases, these diseases may get worse in some cases. Therefore, the probability of a stroke at a young age will increase. Some statistics that estimate that the number of people who have been exposed to premature death due to diseases resulting from the decline of physical activity is approximately 5 million people every year. According to Ulf Ekelund (2016), a professor in physical activity and health at the Norwegian School of Sport Sciences and the University of Cambridge, sitting for 8 hours, but with physical activity included in the day, is less dangerous to exposure to an early death.

In conclusion, physical activities are an essential part of our life. Ignoring it will increase the risk of having chronic diseases such as heart disease, diabetes, some types of cancer, and many other diseases that we can avoid just by doing physical activities. More than that, it can cause premature death. However, even if your work requires sitting for a long period, you can protect yourself from this risk by including easy activity to your day like walking for 30 minutes or 15 minutes at least. And finally, remember that a healthy mind in a healthy body.