Sick but healthy

You can be healthy without being healthy. Or you can be sick and still be healthy. Healthy and well are not the same thing. When you are ill, you are not well, but it is still important to stay healthy and active. This can help you prevent your condition from getting worse or even improve it. In more serious illnesses, such as those that keep you bedridden, it can be particularly important to keep moving, even if it just means moving your joints and doing some light muscle exercises. Strengthening your muscles is good for your metabolism and for maintaining muscle mass. Physical activity improves mood, well-being and reduces feelings of anxiety and stress.

Consequences of lazy days

An older study shows that after 3 weeks in bed, a person is in as much worse shape as when they are 30 years older. Another study looked at what happens to the body after 14 lazy days. 14 lazy days means that you do your work, but always choose the lazy route. This means taking the car instead of the bike, ordering food online and having it delivered to your door, etc. In this way, you can manage around 1500 steps a day. After 14 days, the subjects developed insulin resistance, which eventually leads to diabetes, their fitness levels dropped by 7%, they lost a large amount of muscle mass and had more fat in their blood and around their organs. This shows how little time it takes for physical inactivity to have negative consequences that can be measured on our bodies.

Exercise on prescription

Prescription exercise is something we will see more and more of in the future, as there is now so much research showing the beneficial effects of physical activity. It is therefore important to keep moving, even if you are sick. However, it should be mentioned that it is of course not possible or beneficial to exercise in all cases of illness. But in the vast majority of cases, exercising or otherwise keeping active has a positive effect.

Age is not an obstacle. Many people have the impression that getting older automatically makes you less fit. But here we can actually blame lifestyle more than the biological clock.

Stay healthy even when you are ill.

By Josefine Huusom