Are we raising the first generation which will not live longer than its
parents? And is it all the fault of fast food French fries and fructose corn
syrup in our foods? Perhaps not. Dr. R.L. DeSausseur, commissioner of health in
Brunswick, Ga., pointed out in 1921 that 40-year-olds had a shorter life
expectancy than 40-year-olds had in 1881. He attributed it to an increasingly
sedentary lifestyle. Here are Dr. DeSausseur’s comments in the article “Exercise and Health,” from the April,
1921, issue of The Health Bulletin, published
by the North Carolina State Board of Health.
At the age of 40 the expectation of life is less now that it
was 30 years ago. This is true for both men and women.
Life expectancy during
infancy and childhood has increased owing to more intelligent care of young
children, to the introduction of diphtheria antitoxin, and other means of
combating the infectious diseases and to more sanitary living. But the diseases
of degeneration are increasing, especially those involving the kidneys, heart
and blood vessels, particularly among persons not employed in manual labor.
One
reason for this is the lessened physical and increased mental work entailed by
our complex social fabric. More people are engaged in sedentary occupations
that formerly. More nervous energy is required of a man. Deprived of the
natural assistance which physical exercise affords in eliminating through skin
and lungs the waste products of the body, the kidneys become overloaded and
fail. Lacking the normal assistance which working muscles give to circulation
as they urge the blood and lymph onward in natural channels, and overloaded
with food poisons which brain work cannot burn up as physical exercise will,
the arteries become brittle and weak and the heart muscle flabby like the
biceps of its unfortunate possessor. The florid business man succumbs to
nephritis; another to a fatty heart or to chronically overtaxed digestion, all
of which could have been postponed for many years by a moderate amount of daily
exercise.
That exercise is good for health and conducive to continued
good health is an axiom. Exercise is necessary for all except those actually
and acutely physically ill, at all ages, for both sexes, daily, in amount just
short of fatigue. For the shop girl this may mean a 3-mile walk, for the clerk,
an hour’s gymnasium work after a rest from the day’s grind, for the business
man, two hours of golf, etc. But it should be taken daily, it should be
compatible with age and physique, it should be enjoyable and not a bore, and it
should never be undertaken when tired or hungry.
There would be fewer women in the doctor’s waiting room if
they took more exercise. Keeping house is not exercise. That’s drudgery. The
woman who has no maid to take the baby out for its two-hour airing is
fortunate. Lacking the necessary baby, the influence of the poodle is not to be
despised.
Heavy athletics are pernicious. They have no place in
hygienic exercise. The after effects of severe exertion are harmful. An
enlarged heart is not a safe organ; a greatly increased lung capacity is not
only useless but dangerous in later life.
After all, there is only one form of exercise that is
available and suitable for all ages and conditions and in all seasons. Walking
is the national pastime of at least one foreign nation whose women are renowned
for their beauty and vigor.
Hinsdale says, “The best medicine! Two miles of oxygen three
times a day. This is not only the best, but cheap and pleasant to take. It
suits all ages and constitutions. It is patented by infinite wisdom, sealed
with a signet divine. It cures cold feet, hot heads, pale faces, feeble lungs,
and bad tempers. If two or three take it together, it has a still more striking
effect. It has often been known to reconcile enemies, settle matrimonial
quarrels, and bring reluctant parties to a state of double blessedness. This
medicine never fails. Spurious compounds are found in large towns; but get into
the country lanes, among the green fields or on the mountain top, and you have
it in perfection as prepared in the great laboratory of nature.”
We are in danger of deteriorating unless we hold fast to
some of the old-fashioned principles of physical upkeep. The rising death rate
after 40 is a warning.
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