Healthcare Triage
1 HN recommender · recommended in 3 months, 2016–2023
6:36 · 292K views · Aug 11, 2015
A Healthcare Triage episode summarizing the evidence on the health benefits of exercise, made in response to people misreading the host's column on exercise and weight. It argues exercise offers large benefits.
HN shares it as an evidence-based summary of exercise benefits supported by good research.
3 comments from Hacker News
This study is looking at one specific mechanism by which exercise may be helpful in improving some aspect of your health. It's not especially useful to look at just this study though, as it doesn't actually link to any outcomes (the telomere protective expression may or may not actually reduce your risk for cardiovascular disease). It's more useful to look at studies that have looked at actual outcomes (e.g. reducing the incidence of heart attack or stroke, etc). In those cases, the bulk of the evidence points to 30 minutes a day, 5 days a week of moderate exercise (e.g. a brisk walk or jog) being the best 'bang for your buck'. There are certainly gains to be made by going beyond that, but the curve falls off pretty sharply, and you can get almost all the (proven) benefits of exercise at that level. EDIT: I would suggest this YouTube video from Healthcare Triage on the benefits of exercise that are supported by good research: this video
I could be wrong, but I don't think projektir means they "feel like shit" even when they exercise. I think they mean they occasionally feel like shit after exercising, which obscures the benefit. If so, I'm in projektir's camp. I often feel better after exercising, but sometimes I feel worse. Also, I don't necessarily see a clear day-to-day improvement. There are definite health benefits to exercise for most people [0], but I don't think subjectively feeling better is necessarily as widespread as some exercise proponents think. [0]: Video summary of the evidence for exercise: this video
Healthcare Triage: "To the research!" [LINK] this video tl;dw -- the relative risk reduction can be as high as 50%, and depending on risk factors, the absolute risk reduction can be 5%.