I would be less skeptical about much of the information we receive today about health if it didn’t appear to be product driven or sourced from the well meaning, and sometimes just as misleading utilitarian and sometimes dogmatic means of keeping us informed.

Both help explain the volume and frequency and claims that could be considered at times wild, not so loudly trumpeted is when the blather collapses under scrutiny.

Butter being wrongly identified by scientist 25 years ago as a bad fat, the health and fitness industry which now encompasses beauty not only prey on, but create insecurity in the vulnerable and fads for faddists.

I take anything I hear about health with a pinch of salt or low sodium salt substitute, better to air on the side of caution if what we hear about one of the white deaths is true – occasionally and its – as rare as fact something is reported that is mere food for thought.

Its been said that, the physical activity of peoples life 50 years ago, when compared to our sedentary lifestyles of today, that they ran the equivalent of a marathon every week. Comparisons go some way to dispel are substantiate the comparative I made certainly was not one associated with health, watching TV are as it was definitively known as 50 years ago the television set. If you did own a television set 1965\6 you probably only had two channels you most certainly would not have had a remote control.

Which meant in order to change channels you had to get up walk across the room press a button then return to your seated position, it seems strange having to explain this but this was a time if a sentence had tweeting in it, birds where also mentioned and if you told someone you had just done a selfie, you probably would not be pressed for any further details.

Getting up from a seats position and returning to it is a power exercise known as a squat beneficial to your musculoskeletal system, muscles and bones, if the average TV viewers circa 65 66, changed channels four times per evening that is 4×365 = 1,460 squat exercises carried out each year and up to a mile and a half walked, just changing channels, a further benefit is every time we stand up we break flexion which is the foetal position we can spend up to 18 hours a day in when sleeping sitting, working and driving in, the human structure was not designed for this much sitting.

This is just one of the less obvious comparisons, in how the physicality of life has changed over the last 50 years, if we were to expand on this and still remain within the household and considered the effort required for other chores – brushing mopping hand washing and drying attending to an open fire? Add lack of car dependency! Wither or not people of 50 years ago ran a marathon every week when compared to people of today, it certainly racks up in favor of their lives being considerably more active than ours, and that is before you left your own home – what was the physical requirement of occupations back then?

Exercise like everything, is better if we willingly engage and don’t have it foisted upon us, however the mechanics of movement still deliver benefits even if carried out involuntarily its now known and always has been by those who engage in it, that light to moderate exercise is as effective if not more so in the treatment of depression than antidepressants.

Its undeniable our lifestyles have went through a huge physical backslide in our most recent history and almost simultaneously psychiatric illnesses many of which never existed 60 years ago have risen from just over 100 to almost 400 today, some would debate the validity of many of these new mental illnesses, believing the lowering of diagnostic thresholds contributes more to these statistics than true sufferers of real conditions.

More worthy of debate, what is the full extent of physical activity and exercise on our mental and overall well-being?

getting through the SHIL