Sedentary Lifestyle And Your RNA

Take a look at this paper from several years ago, abstract:

Pioneering epidemiological work has established strong association of sedentary lifestyle and obesity with the risk of colorectal cancer, while the detailed underlying mechanism remains unknown. Here we show that Hotair (HOX transcript antisense RNA) is a pro-adipogenic long non-coding RNA highly expressed in gluteal-femoral fat over other fat depots. Hotair knockout in adipose tissue results in gluteal-femoral fat defect. Squeeze of the gluteal-femoral fat induces intestinal proliferation in wildtype mice, while not in Hotair knockout mice. Mechanistically, squeeze of the gluteal-femoral fat induces exosomal Hotair secretion mainly by transcriptional upregulation of Hotair via NFκB. And increased exosomal Hotair in turn circulates in the blood and is partially endocytosed by the intestine, finally promoting the stemness and proliferation of intestinal stem/progenitor cells via Wnt activation. Clinically, obese subjects with sedentary lifestyle have much higher exosomal HOTAIR expression in the serum. These findings establish that sedentary lifestyle promotes exosomal Hotair release from the gluteal-femoral fat, which in turn facilitates intestinal stem and/or progenitor proliferation, raising a possible link between sedentary lifestyle with colorectal tumorigenesis.

So, there is a link between a sedentary lifestyle, and release of this HOTAIR RNA from fat, which in turn promotes the growth of intestinal stem cells and/or progenitors - cells that form the target population for mutation leading to colorectal cancer.  The importance of an active lifestyle and a lean physique is underscored by these findings, in my opinion.

Economic Costs Of An Inactive Aging Population

Aging, inactive populations result in costs, including economic costs, on nation and society.  This applies to Germany and most other developed nations) and approaches to stimulate physical activity and promote good health among the aging population.  Abstract:

BACKGROUND:

Aging societies represent a major challenge for health care systems all over the world. As older people tend to be more physically inactive, economic costs of inactivity are likely to increase notably. The present study aims to investigate this relationship between an aging society and economic costs of inactivity using the example of Germany.

METHODS:

Using data from the German Socio-Economic Panel, this study applied the comparative risk assessment method developed by the WHO to estimate the direct costs of inactivity for the period 2001-2013 differentiated by gender-specific age-groups (15-29; 30-44; 45-64; 65+). Based on population statistics predicting the aging of the German population for the years 2014-2060, this research projects the development of future costs of inactivity and potential effects of interventions promoting physical activity among the German population.

RESULTS:

The results reveal an increase in the level of physical activity during the observed period (2001-2013) which compensated the negative effect of aging and resulted in a decline of inactivity costs. The projections for the years 2014-2060 indicate a constant increase in direct per capita costs until 2060 because of an aging society. Scenarios indicating how a short-term reduction of physical inactivity impacts costs of inactivity reveal the crucial role of the oldest age-group in this context.

CONCLUSION:

The findings indicate that the aging of the German population demands further actions and initiatives to promote physical activity, especially for the oldest age-group.

TV Viewing Increases Physical Frailty In The Elderly

By Wags05 at English Wikipedia - Own work, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=43906515

A study was performed to determine whether the time spent watching television was associated with increased physical frailty in older individuals.

The background/objective from the abstract:

Sedentariness is an important risk factor for poor health. The main objective of this work was to examine the prospective association between television viewing time and indicators of physical function, mobility, agility, and frailty.

And the conclusions from the abstract:

Among older adults, longer television viewing time is prospectively associated with limitations in physical function independently of physical activity.

So, it would seem sitting watching television is a particularly pernicious form of inactivity that causes decreased physical function, at least in the older individuals studied.  Perhaps because watching television is such a passive experience (for example, reading a book may be physically passive but at least the mind is being used) it has such a negative impact. Get off the couch and start doing something.

Jumping jacks or medications

Have you seen the hilarious comments of sir Ken Robinson on attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in America? If not, watch RSA Animate - Changing Education Paradigms at approximately minute 3:40.

Can you imagine the following description of the human evolution: “Our predecessors evolved by sitting for hours and listening to the speeches of their tribal leaders. In fact, our predecessors rarely engaged in any physical activity. The children and adolescents occasionally (once or twice weekly) practiced hunting for 45 minutes, but for the rest of the time they sat and listened to the adults preaching them about many unrelated to life things.” 

Wait a minute! This is not how Homo sapiens developed! However, the fact that our children sit through hours of lessons in school means that our current educational system has gone against the very evolutionary mechanisms that allowed us to become humans. My child (and I assure you, your child) sits, listens or watches something for more than 12 hours every day. Our brain did not evolve to be occupied for 12 hours with listening, reading and learning, and our body did not evolve to be unused and restrained for 12 hours every day. ADHD is the result of our crime against our bodies and brains. 

What are the results of this crime? Here are some shocking facts from the Centers of Disease Control: Recent surveys asked parents whether their child received an ADHD diagnosis from a health care provider. The results show that:

• Approximately 11% of children 4-17 years of age (6.4 million) have been diagnosed with ADHD as of 2011.

• The percentage of children with an ADHD diagnosis continues to increase, from 7.8% in 2003 to 9.5% in 2007 and to 11.0% in 2011.

• Rates of ADHD diagnosis increased an average of 3% per year from 1997 to 2006 and an average of approximately 5% per year from 2003 to 2011.

• Boys (13.2%) were more likely than girls (5.6%) to have ever been diagnosed with ADHD.

• The average age of ADHD diagnosis was 7 years of age, but children reported by their parents as having more severe ADHD were diagnosed earlier.

• Prevalence of ADHD diagnosis varied substantially by state, from a low of 5.6% in Nevada to a high of 18.7% in Kentucky.

One of the many consequences of this ADHD obsession is that in adulthood, the number of stimulant misusers addicted to ADHD medications has been increasing. The drug supply has risen sharply: about 2.6 million American adults received ADHD medication in 2012, a rise of 53% in four years. Use of ADHD medications among adults 26- to 34-year old has almost doubled.  
Actionable
Dear doctors, instead of ADHD medications, would you please prescribe jumping jacks to our children? Dear federal government, instead of being blind to the drugging of our children, would you require the school system to offer time and space for the prescribed jumping jacks? By the way, sir Ken Robinson suggested that we offer dances instead of jumping. I agree, a daily dose of dancing might be better.