By Rajdeep Jheeta
HEALTH EXPERTS say millennials should take up yoga and pilates if they want to avoid experiencing health problems an elderly person would normally have.
A recent report by Bupa found that millennials – people reaching young adulthood around the year 2000 – are the ‘stress generation’, and are suffering physically.
In the report Dr Steve Iley, medical director of Bupa UK said: “From their early twenties, more and more people are working long hours, with jam-packed schedules, and without the ability to ever really switch off. This, combined with bad postures and lack of movement, are taking their toll physically and mentally.”
Chartered physiotherapist Sarah Field, from Leeds, agreed: “It is down to people sitting badly everywhere. They do not get up and move around. In proportion to the younger and older generation, stress is an add-on.
“Most of them are overloading themselves and not fit enough. People take the car more and just sit at their computers. You need to get up and move after 40-45 minutes from you work desk. If you cannot naturally get a break, then you need to create one.”
Field advised that taking up yoga and pilates was really helpful to strengthen muscles, stretch, and move. She said the majority of her clients are students.
Jaymish Patel, a qualified personal trainer from Leeds, said: “In society today, the nation as a whole is lazy.
“There have been various schemes put in place in schools to get children active to combat the rise in obesity, and it seems to be working. However, the millennial generation are affected the most due to long hours at work because some do not have job security and are having to work that extra mile.”
He said that the risk factors of this are cardiovascular diseases, cancer, depression, increase in blood pressure, and headaches.
Some larger businesses actively encourage employees to exercise to combat ill health.
Nicki Mottos from Yorkshire Building Society in Leeds said: “There are plenty of health benefits here, we have a gym at the main firm which we all benefit from, and it is really helpful in terms of destressing.”