Thursday 8 December 2011

Do we need a jogging tax?

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On the logic that people should be discouraged from engaging in lifestyle choices that damage their health - that these things should be "denormalised" - we should take action about jogging. Especially given the burden such inconsiderate activity places on the the NHS.


MRI scans on 40 athletes training for challenging sporting events like triathlons or alpine cycle races showed most had stretched heart muscles.

Although many went on to make a complete recovery after a week, five showed more permanent injuries.

The researchers told the European Heart Journal how these changes might cause heart problems like arrhythmia. 

I know the industry - let's call it "Big Gym" - says these are minor considerations and that "endurance training isn't unhealthy" but surely something must be done.  And remember that it's not just this increased risk of heart disease, there are over 250,000 admissions to hospital resulting from sports injuries in the UK alone.

Perhaps we should set up Exercise Concern?

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4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Those stress fractures caused by jogging sound particularly nasty.

I see them thudding past the bottom of my garden, faces twisted with the strain.

What if one of their fractured legs suddenly falls apart and I have to drag them out of the shrubbery?

Or they might be laying in the hedge overnight, suffering unseen.

It would be difficult to tell the screech of a fox from an injured runner.

Very inconsiderate of them, yet the government seems to encourage it.

At least if they were hugely obese I would be very unlikely to find one of them lying under my hedge.


Rose

Michael Fowke said...

Big Gym is a disgrace. Something certainly needs to be done.

Lord T said...

Don't forget the children. They watch these guys showing off their muscles and body and then they want to do it. One walk leads to another and before you now it they are jogging, weightlifting and playing tennis.

Wlking is a gateway to the harder stuff like jogging.

It's for the children. Something must be done.

Dembones said...

Yeh Duncan Bannatyne are you listening? First they came for the smokers......