Covid-19 & Health Update: Exercise as Medicine During the Pandemic

RVAchironeuro • January 24, 2022

Hello again friends:

  As I recover from Covid, I had some time to think about what I might have done differently regarding prevention and recovery strategies. As a normal part of my lifestyle, I routinely perform around 4 hours of yoga every week. After doing a bit of research, I think I will add a bit more exercise. Here is why I think that this information is critical for all of us, and especially those of us over 50 as this demographic was the hardest hit by Covid-19 and its variants:

“Physical exercise is seen as the main ally for health promotion, preventing and protecting the organism from several diseases. Additionally, it is well-established that the practice of physical exercise is essential for well-being in the elderly population. 

  Recently, the world population started the confrontation against (COVID-19), which today is the most significant public health challenge in the world.

  Determined as a pandemic (when on a large scale of severity in most parts of the world), organizations responsible for the prevention, maintenance, and treatment standards related to human health outlined some measures: social distancing. Since then, this has been the primary strategy in the fight against COVID-19 in several countries in the world. As a result, the limited practice of physical exercise became a significant concern for the elderly population.

  However, physical exercise is a powerful ally for improving health, as it acts efficiently on the elderly immune function. It was reflected in better systemic functioning, mainly preventing infectious diseases .”

Bottom Line:

As this article states, Exercise is Medicine for Health Promotion. While this paper focuses on the most at risk part of our population and the one that suffered the most deaths, this information applies to most of us and all ages. Recently, research has revealed that the “prevalence of metabolic health in American adults is ‘alarmingly low’, even among people who are a normal weight.” The researchers state that only 12% of us can be considered metabolically healthy and to restore oneself to metabolic health does not mean spending all day in the gym. It means eating right (avoid sugar, bad carbs, bad fats, toxins, and pesticides in foods by going organic, going plant based and reducing all animal products as a starter) and moving right and lowering stress. The links below give you more information and additional strategies to recover your metabolic health, thus improving your immune system and reducing risks from all infections. Now is a good time to upgrade your lifestyle patterns to optimize your health and safeguard your future as it relates to all aspects of your health and wellbeing.

 

 

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Health News Update: Inflammaging is Bad News

By Mark Smith • August 25, 2025
Hello everyone: I think I have mentioned inflammaging before but never really focused on it. So, let’s dig into this interesting topic. Inflammaging is when chronic, low-grade inflammation develops with age as dietary and environmental stress accumulates, contributing to the development of all of the various age-related diseases and health issues. It results from a loss of control over systemic inflammation, which tends to come from an unbalanced and dysregulated immune system. One of the key drivers of inflammaging is diet…which means that one of the key tools to slow and reduce aging is our what we eat as well as what we don’t eat. In this paper, the authors reveal that the typical Western Diet (what science calls the Standard American Diet or S.A.D.) is the best example of a pro-inflammatory diet pattern. “ Conclusion: Inflammation is a key physiological process in immunity and tissue repair. However, during aging it becomes increasingly more chronic. In addition, we found that certain foods such as saturated fats have pro-inflammatory activity. Taking this into account, in this review we have proposed some dietary guidelines as well as a list of compounds present in foods with anti-inflammatory activity. It must be taken into account that the amounts used in the studies that detect anti-inflammatory activity of these compounds are very high, and the intake of a single food to achieve its anti-inflammatory power is not feasible. (My Comment: what this means is that it is the overall dietary pattern that matters the most.) However, the combination of foods rich in compounds with anti-inflammatory activity could exert beneficial effects during aging and in pathologies associated with inflammation and in reducing the detrimental effects of foods with pro-inflammatory activity. Therefore, we can conclude that the compounds in our diet with anti-inflammatory activity could help alleviate the inflammatory processes derived from diseases and unhealthy diets and thereby promote healthy aging. Thus, we can use diet not only for nourishment, but also as medicine.” https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8389628/ anti-inflammatory diet and health aging https://www.healthline.com/health/5-minute-guide-to-inflamm-aging Bottom Line: We all must age, and how we do so is largely under our own control. To create an anti-inflammatory lifestyle is not that difficult, especially if you put it all together in stages. Start with a clean, whole-food, unprocessed plant-based food plan. And to begin, first focus on what you can add into your menus and use those additions to sort of crowd out the things that are more inflammatory…sugar, refined grains, processed and pre-packaged things. Set realistic goals such as going plant based one or two days a week, or even one meal…just start and gradually work up. It has to be doable so don’t stress. Next, start moving and doing regular exercise at least three times a week…and find what you enjoy doing and focus on that. Then add activities that de-stress you, whether that is socializing, church, meditation, prayer, yoga, etc. Overall, shift your attention to giving love to things that love you back. Sugar, drive-thru and processed food like thingies do not love you back but apples or kiwis or berries or veggies do. Sitting around does not love you back but going for a short walk after a meal does love you back. Hang out and give love to the people you really like to be with, they will most always love you back. Create a love you back lifestyle and see how you feel.

Health News Update: Blocking Internet on Smartphones Improves Mental Health

By Mark Smith • August 18, 2025
Hello everyone: I frequently hear about mental health issues with the people in our practice. They could be experiencing depression, or anxiety, feel flat, can’t focus or sustain attention, or may not feel well in general. These comments can come from anyone of any age…I can hear from parents about their kids, or it may be themselves experiencing these feeling. So, when I read this paper, it felt important to share it because we all seem to have mobile phones. Here is how the paper is summarized: “Concern about how smartphones affect users is widespread: half of American smartphone users—and 80% of those under age 30—worry that they use their device too much, and correlational research suggests that smartphone use is negatively related to mental health and cognitive functioning. However, few large-scale experiments have tested for causal effects. We report such an experiment, finding that blocking mobile internet for 2 weeks reduces smartphone use and improves subjective well-being (SWB) (including life satisfaction and positive affect), mental health (more than antidepressants), and sustained attention (as much as being 10 years younger). Despite the many benefits mobile internet offers, reducing the constant connection to the digital world can have large positive effects.” https://academic.oup.com/pnasnexus/article/4/2/pgaf017/8016017?utm_source=klaviyo&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=%28Email%20-%20Chris%20Kresser%20General%20News%29%20Chris%27s%20Friday%20Favorites&utm_term=randomized%20controlled%20trial&utm_content=randomized%20controlled%20trial&_kx=fARhTo_gi8X3B_2-MaeO_RyzUl9tvT3tr4re-Dy7cNQ.my75y6 Bottom Line: It seems like a smartphone ‘timeout’ can be very beneficial for mental, emotional, physical health and can be an important part of stress reduction. The world today, with nearly instant communications, the almost constant bad and anxiety promoting news, and the fast pace of data consumption can add up to significantly stress us out and pull us down…or just simple keep us distracted. From what I can see, a ‘timeout’ may be just what the doctor ordered.
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