Posts Tagged ‘exercise’

A new randomized, controlled study published yesterday in JAMA found that fitness trackers added to a 24-month weight loss program did not help with weight loss. In fact, adding them actually resulted in less weight loss. People in the control arm with a standard weight loss program lost an average of 13 pounds after 24 months. […]

The American Heart Association is promoting an analysis from its journal that suggests regular exercise can save money. In fact, the authors of this study find that medical expenses are about $2,500 lower annually for people who meet current guidelines for regular exercise. That’s at least 30 minutes of moderate exercise five times a week. The […]

For decades, the common dogma of energy balance stated that weight gain or loss is a simple matter of “calories in and calories out.” On the second day of YWM2016, Steve Blair called for a rethinking of “nonsense presented repeatedly without any data to back it up.” At the top of his list for such nonsense, he […]

Oops. McDonald’s has been giving out free activity trackers to encourage kids to burn calories. In return, the company received more attention for burned skin than burned calories. McDonald’s swiftly removed the trackers from its Happy Meals when photos of burned wrists started going viral on the internet tubes. We’re going to miss those adorable Step-It activity […]

In scientific advisories, obscurity and equivocation abound more than clarity. So the latest advisory from the American Heart Association (AHA) provides more elegant advice than most: “sit less and move more.” True, the advisory goes on for 11 pages before it gets to that punch line. But at least it has a punch line. Here’s the thing. […]

If you think that body composition – and thus obesity – is primarily the result of personal choices, we ask you to consider the case of Brandon Ingram. He is a “skinny kid”  who is desperately trying to put on some weight so he can reach his full potential as a professional basketball player. As it is, […]

A fitness culture is spreading around the world that has great potential to promote better health and well-being. But even a small element of shaming can undermine all of that. Look at fashion, look at daily routines everywhere, and the fitness culture is impossible to miss. While much of life has become a sedentary ritual of enslavement to glowing rectangles, […]

A new study in the American Journal of Public Health provides encouraging evidence that community-based obesity prevention can work in disadvantaged black communities to reduce the prevalence of obesity. Youlian Liao and colleagues from the CDC analyzed changes in the prevalence of obesity in communities targeted for the REACH US program. Liao told MedicalResearch.com: In […]

The $3.4 trillion fitness industry has prospered because it has come to represent an identity for the people who participate. In an interview with Marketplace, Bloomberg’s Jason Kelly explains: What is so interesting about it, I think, is this idea that it has moved from activity to lifestyle. Once it moves to a lifestyle, then […]

“To keep obesity at bay, exercise may trump diet.” This headline from the New York Times follows a longstanding theme: a false choice between exercise and diet. Simply framing the question this way offers up bad choices. The reason for the headline was a rat study. It showed health benefits for exercise in rats that were […]