Introduction
Inasmuch as many people find it difficult to maintain little physical activity, engaging in regular physical exercises such as aerobics and less intense physical activities such as jogging, walking, and dancing often play a vital role in reducing frequencies of contracting diseases such as cancer, heart problems, and other chronic health problems. In the developed world, the most popular causes of death include cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases. Some of the risk factors associated with such diseases include lifestyle characteristics such as smoking, hypertension in the arteries, obesity, and high blood sugar levels.
Such conditions or a combination of such conditions compromises the body’s immune system from fighting back, hence increasing vulnerability. In order to reduce blood sugar level, fats, and calories in the body, health care practitioners and nutritionists encourage healthy eating habits and regular physical activities to regulate the blood sugar levels and the control storage of calories.
Exercise lowers the risk of suffering from diseases
Weight control
Weight and obesity traits present ample body conditions for chronic and lifestyles. Heart condition, hypertension, kidney failures, and cancer are prevalent in people with high body masses. Controlling weight, therefore, translates to reduced chances of contracting unhealthy conditions. Both dieting and engaging in physical activities help in controlling body weight. Human physiology dictates that the rates at which people add weight has a direct correlation with the rate at which such persons burn their calories they take in foods. Physical activities such as jogging, running, and walking up the staircases help the body systems in burning calories (Reimers, Knapp, and Reimers 111).
Strengthening bones and muscles
Human bones and muscles grow fragile with age. People with less body activity suffer risks of osteoporosis more than individual with physical body activity. Even though care remains necessary in physical activities at old age, research indicates that walking, jogging, and other moderate physical activities help in strengthening the muscles and bones. Likewise, aerobics with moderate intensities slow the rate of bone loss, leading to reduction in cases of brittleness and weakness in the bones. Keeping bones and muscles active help in ensuring fitness of body joints, thus reducing cases of hip and wrist fractures associated with osteoporosis (Reimers, Knapp, and Reimers 115).
Improving mental health, physical stability, and mood
Body inactivity reduces thinking, learning, and judgment skills. Similarly, it increases vulnerability to depression and stress disorders that reduces life expectancy. On the other hand, physical activities help in enhancing mental health and mood. Engaging in aerobics like dance and jog enhance happiness and control stress levels. Likewise, effective activity ensures adequate physical fitness that reduces vulnerability to falls in cases of emergency. Reduced fall frequencies helps in regulating fall related conditions such as bone fractures.
Even the data above show close relationship between physical activity and improved health situations; the research indicates that physical activity requires complimentary use with other factors to help in improving health status. For example, engagement in less intensive physical activity requires sanity in eating and dieting habits to control weight gains. On the same note, physical activities require regulation to control the level of calories content in the body.
Similarly, different body structure and physiological characteristics inform the level of human physical activity. Hereditary weak bone syndrome, gender, racial orientation, and other factor inform the ability of individual to engage in physical activities. For example, women at thirty years in the US add 2.19 years into their lifespan if they engage in a 15-minute vigorous physical activity for at least three times a week. Women in the same country add 3.4 years at the age of sixty-five. Factors that reduce the lifespan in the second age group include smoking habits, blood pressure levels, diabetes tendencies, body mass index, and hormone replacement level among others (Schuna, Johnson, and Tudor-Locke 116).
Developing concrete estimates on the value of intensity of physical activities also compromises the argument that engagement in physical activities increase health status. Developing a standard unit for measuring these attributes has to consider the age, body physiological characteristics, and physique among other factors. Use of ambiguous groups such as “physical activity”, “less intense”, and “vigorous” as units of measuring activity levels lacks proper assessment and valuation measures. As a result, the measure often fails to present the actual level of body activity. This implies that scholars in the physical education and health fraternity lack an ideal measurement for the actual value of physical activities levels in the body immune system (Schuna, Johnson, and Tudor-Locke 116).
Conclusion
Physical activities reduce major risks and hazards responsible for human illness. Chances of an individual suffering from hypertension, diabetes mellitus, osteoporosis, heart diseases, kidney failures, stroke, and cancer reduce with increases in body physical engagements. With statistics showing an average of 32.5 per cent decrease in mortality with increase in physical activity, there is need to integrate physical activities into individual diaries. Despite the fact that physical activity requires support from behavior changes such as dieting and healthy living, quitting smoking, avoiding junk foods, and alcohol, it is important to note that physical activity strengthens the human system, reduces stress levels, improves mood, boosts bones, and enhances body muscles. All these factors improve the health standards of human beings.
Works Cited
Reimers, Carl, Guido Knapp, and Anne Reimers. “Does physical activity increase life expectancy? A review of the literature.” Journal of Aging Research 1.1 (2012): 108-117. Print.
Schuna, John, William Johnson, and Catrine Tudor-Locke. “Adult self-reported and objectively monitored physical activity and sedentary behavior: NHANES 2005–2006.” International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity 10.126 (2013): 413-119. Print