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Study says couch potatoes at risk
IF YOU are planning to catch the World Cup quarter-final matches tonight and tomorrow, here’s something to think
about.
A recent study conducted in the UK found for every hour a day that a person spends watching TV increases the risk of death by heart disease by 7 per cent.
People in the UK spend an average of four hours a day in front of the goggle box.
The study is making waves in the UK, where heart disease causes 193,000 deaths a year and is responsible for a third of the deaths there.
People here also have cause for worry. Statistics from the Ministry of Health show that heart disease accounted for 20.1 per cent of the 17,222 deaths in Singapore in 2008.
Two of the three cardiologists contacted byThe New Paper agreed with the study.
The decade-long study, conducted by UK’s Medical Research Council, followed 13,197 healthy men and women between 45 and 79 years old from Norfolk – and 373 of them died from heart disease.
That’s about one in every 35 people. Dr Katrien Wijndaele, co-author of the study from the Medical Research Council (MRC), warned: “Our bodies are not designed to sit for long periods.
“As we put in the TV hours watching the World Cup, our risk of heart disease is probably increasing.”
The amount of time spent watching TV was found to be a significant marker of the participants’ likelihood of death from heart disease.
Dr Ong Hean Yee, consultant and head of cardiovascular medicine at the Khoo Teck Puat Hospital, believes that people here should be concerned if their TV consumption keeps them from doing the “recommended 30 to 40 minutes of exercise every other day”.
He added: “We have known for many years that lack of exercise is strongly linked to premature heart disease.”
Dr Goh Ping Ping, chief and senior consultant of the department of cardiology at the Changi General Hospital, said that it was “not enough” to exercise more.
People have to be up and about too.
He explained: “Excessively long hours of inactivity – watching TV is a common example – can be risky for cardiovascular health.”
Exercise
Avid television viewers, he said, should do “on-the-spot running” and “step aerobics” while watching TV.
Dr Ong agreed, saying that people should include regular exercise “instead of surfing the Internet or watching TV”.
Dr Ulf Ekelund, a co-author of the UK study said: “Watching a couple of hours less TV a night and being physically active for at least 30 minutes a day can substantially reduce our risk of heart disease.”
However, Dr Felix Keng, senior consultant of the department of cardiology at the National Heart Centre Singapore, felt that people should not be overly alarmed.
“There is no scientific basis that watching TV is an independent risk factor for heart artery disease,” he said.
He also felt the study’s conclusion was an “over-simplification of the situation” – couch potatoes often lead sedentary lifestyles too.
Football fans we spoke to were unfazed.
Civil servant Chris Yeo, 21, said: “It doesn’t matter to me, the excitement of a football match is too irresistible to miss.”
Mr Shawn Tanudjaja, 22, who works in the food and beverage industry, wondered if the study’s findings were exaggerated.
He said: “The World Cup is once every four years and lasts only for a month. Where’s the harm?”
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