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| Don’t compare smoking with sitting | | | A study carried out by an American Journal of Public Health study states that adults typically spend nine hours per day sitting. This is largely due to many jobs becoming more dependent on computers.
According to the study, those who sit less than four hours per day have fewer adverse health effects compared to those who sit for more than eight hours per day.
Despite this, the adverse effects of sitting aren’t equal to those involved with smoking. In the recent past there was propaganda all over the social media that sitting is as bad as smoking.
According to the experts too much sitting increase risk for poor health outcomes, like cardiovascular disease, all-cause mortality, cancer mortality, and even depression. The strongest risk of sitting too much is diabetes — it doubles the risk. Comparatively, smoking has long been understood to be hazardous to health. In the 21st century alone, smoking will cause over 1 billion deaths. In 2012, it led to an annual global health cost of $467 billion in cigarette-related illnesses.
According to the new study, estimates suggest that the cost of physical inactivity (not getting at least 150 minutes of physical activity per week) was $53.8 billion in 2013 — about 12 percent of the health-related costs of smoking.
Sedentary life styles are harmful but these are not as harmful as smoking. Tobacco use continues to be the greatest cause of death and diseases, and is responsible for one million casualties in India every year. It remains the cause of numerous diseases like cancer, lung disease and stroke.
As per surveys, it accounts for nearly 1.35 million deaths every year in India. The country ranks second in the number of smokers between the ages of 16 and 64. Tobacco use is a major public health concern as well as causes significant financial costs. A World Health Organization survey found that the financial burden of tobacco-use in India stood at one per cent of its GDP. Of all the countries, India has the highest proportion of oral cancer patients among young adults. Behavioural science says that people sometimes take decisions because these are manipulated by the information available to them. Public awareness programmes must be formulated to sensitize smokers to the risks they pose to themselves and those exposed due to secondary smoking, and the misinformation about smoking being equivalent to sitting needs to be countered. |
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