How much time should you spend sitting versus standing? New research reveals the perfect mix for optimal health
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People have a pretty intuitive sense of what is healthy – standing is better than sitting, exercise is great for overall health and getting good sleep is imperative.
However, if exercise in the evening may disrupt our sleep, or make us feel the need to be more sedentary to recover, a key question emerges – what is the best way to balance our 24 hours to optimise our health?
Our research attempted to answer this for risk factors for heart disease, stroke and diabetes. We found the optimal amount of sleep was 8.3 hours, while for light activity and moderate to vigorous activity, it was best to get 2.2 hours each.
Finding the right balance
Current health guidelines recommend you stick to a sensible regime of moderate-to vigorous-intensity physical activity 2.5–5 hours per week.
However mounting evidence now suggests how you spend your day can have meaningful ramifications for your health. In addition to moderate-to vigorous-intensity physical activity, this means the time you spend sitting, standing, doing light physical activity (such as walking around your house or office) and sleeping.
Our research looked at more than 2,000 adults who wore body sensors that could interpret their physical behaviours, for seven days. This gave us a sense of how they spent their average 24 hours.
At the start of the study participants had their waist circumference, blood sugar and insulin sensitivity measured. The body sensor and assessment data was matched and analysed then tested against health risk markers — such as a heart disease and stroke risk score — to create a model.
Using this model, we fed through thousands of permutations of 24 hours and found the ones with the estimated lowest associations with heart disease risk and blood-glucose levels. This created many optimal mixes of sitting, standing, light and moderate intensity activity.
When we looked at waist circumference, blood sugar, insulin sensitivity and a heart disease and stroke risk score, we noted differing optimal time zones. Where those zones mutually overlapped was ascribed the optimal zone for heart disease and diabetes risk.
You’re doing more physical activity than you think
We found light-intensity physical activity (defined as walking less than 100 steps per minute) – such as walking to the water cooler, the bathroom, or strolling casually with friends – had strong associations with glucose control, and especially in people with type 2 diabetes. This light-intensity physical activity is likely accumulated intermittently throughout the day rather than being a purposeful bout of light exercise.
Our experimental evidence shows that interrupting our sitting regularly with light-physical activity (such as taking a 3–5 minute walk every hour) can improve our metabolism, especially so after lunch.
While the moderate-to-vigorous physical activity time might seem a quite high, at more than 2 hours a day, we defined it as more than 100 steps per minute. This equates to a brisk walk.
It should be noted that these findings are preliminary. This is the first study of heart disease and diabetes risk and the “optimal” 24 hours, and the results will need further confirmation with longer prospective studies.
The data is also cross-sectional. This means that the estimates of time use are correlated with the disease risk factors, meaning it’s unclear whether how participants spent their time influences their risk factors or whether those risk factors influence how someone spends their time.
Australia’s adult physical activity guidelines need updating
Australia’s physical activity guidelines currently only recommend exercise intensity and time. A new set of guidelines are being developed to incorporate 24-hour movement. Soon Australians will be able to use these guidelines to examine their 24 hours and understand where they can make improvements.
While our new research can inform the upcoming guidelines, we should keep in mind that the recommendations are like a north star: something to head towards to improve your health. In principle this means reducing sitting time where possible, increasing standing and light-intensity physical activity, increasing more vigorous intensity physical activity, and aiming for a healthy sleep of 7.5–9 hours per night.
Beneficial changes could come in the form of reducing screen time in the evening or opting for an active commute over driving commute, or prioritising an earlier bed time over watching television in the evening.
It’s also important to acknowledge these are recommendations for an able adult. We all have different considerations, and above all, movement should be fun.
Christian Brakenridge, Postdoctoral research fellow at Swinburne University Centre for Urban Transitions, Swinburne University of Technology
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
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Dr. Suzanne Steinbaum’s Heart Book – by Dr. Suzanne Steinbaum
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The book is divided into three parts:
- What you should know
- What you should do
- All about you
This is a very useful format, since it lays out all the foundational knowledge, before offering practical advice and “how to” explanations, before finally wrapping up with personalizing things.
The latter is important, because while our basic risk factors can be assembled in a few lines of data (age, sex, race, genes, diet, exercise habits, etc) there’s a lot more to us than that, and oftentimes the data that doesn’t make the cut, makes the difference. Hormones on high on this list; we can say that a person is a 65-year-old woman and make a guess, but that’s all it is: a guess. Very few of us are the “average person” that statistical models represent accurately. And nor are social and psychological factors irrelevant; in fact often they are deciding factors!
So, it’s important to be able to look at ourselves as the whole persons we are, or else we’ll get a heart-healthy protocol that works on paper but actually falls flat in application, because the mathematical model didn’t take into account that lately we have been very stressed about such-and-such a thing, and deeply anxious about so-and-so, and a hopefully short-term respiratory infection has reduced blood oxygen levels, and all these kinds of things need to be taken into account too, for an overall plan to work.
The greatest strength of this book is that it attends to that.
The style of the book is a little like a long sales pitch (when all that’s being sold, by the way, is the ideas the book is offering; she wants you to take her advice with enthusiasm), but there’s plenty of very good information all the way through, making it quite worth the read.
Bottom line: if you’re a woman and/or love at least one woman, then you can benefit from this important book for understanding heart health that’s not the default.
Click here to check out Dr. Suzanne Steinbaum’s Heart Book, and enjoy a heart-healthy life!
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What Would a Second Trump Presidency Look Like for Health Care?
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On the presidential campaign trail, former President Donald Trump is, once again, promising to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act — a nebulous goal that became one of his administration’s splashiest policy failures.
“We’re going to fight for much better health care than Obamacare. Obamacare is a catastrophe,” Trump said at a campaign stop in Iowa on Jan. 6.
The perplexing revival of one of Trump’s most politically damaging crusades comes at a time when the Obama-era health law is even more popular and widely used than it was in 2017, when Trump and congressional Republicans proved unable to pass their own plan to replace it. That failed effort was a big part of why Republicans lost control of the House of Representatives in the 2018 midterms.
Despite repeated promises, Trump never presented his own Obamacare replacement. And much of what Trump’s administration actually accomplished in health care has been reversed by the Biden administration.
Still, Trump secured some significant policy changes that remain in place today, including efforts to bring more transparency to prices charged by hospitals and paid by health insurers.
Trying to predict Trump’s priorities in a second term is even more difficult given that he frequently changes his positions on issues, sometimes multiple times.
The Trump campaign did not respond to a request for comment.
Perhaps Trump’s biggest achievement is something he rarely talks about on the campaign trail. His administration’s “Operation Warp Speed” managed to create, test, and bring to market a covid-19 vaccine in less than a year, far faster than even the most optimistic predictions.
Many of Trump’s supporters, though, don’t support — and some even vehemently oppose — covid vaccines.
Here is a recap of Trump’s health care record:
Public Health
Trump’s pandemic response dominates his overall record on health care.
More than 400,000 Americans died from covid over Trump’s last year in office. His travel bans and other efforts to prevent the global spread of the virus were ineffective, his administration was slower than other countries’ governments to develop a diagnostic test, and he publicly clashed with his own government’s health officials over the response.
Ahead of the 2020 election, Trump resumed large rallies and other public campaign events that many public health experts regarded as reckless in the face of a highly contagious, deadly virus. He personally flouted public health guidance after contracting covid himself and ending up hospitalized.
At the same time, despite what many saw as a politicization of public health by the White House, Trump signed a massive covid relief bill (after first threatening to veto it). He also presided over some of the largest boosts for the National Institutes of Health’s budget since the turn of the century. And the mRNA-based vaccines Operation Warp Speed helped develop were an astounding scientific breakthrough credited with helping save millions of lives while laying the groundwork for future shots to fight other diseases including cancer.
Abortion
Trump’s biggest contribution to abortion policy was indirect: He appointed three Supreme Court justices, who were instrumental in overturning the constitutional right to an abortion.
During his 2024 campaign, Trump has been all over the place on the red-hot issue. Since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, Trump has bemoaned the issue as politically bad for Republicans; criticized one of his rivals, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, for signing a six-week abortion ban; and vowed to broker a compromise with “both sides” on abortion, promising that “for the first time in 52 years, you’ll have an issue that we can put behind us.”
He has so far avoided spelling out how he’d do that, or whether he’d support a national abortion ban after any number of weeks.
More recently, however, Trump appears to have mended fences over his criticism of Florida’s six-week ban and more with key abortion opponents, whose support helped him get elected in 2016 — and whom he repaid with a long list of policy changes during his presidency.
Among the anti-abortion actions taken by the Trump administration were a reinstatement of the “Mexico City Policy” that bars giving federal funds to international organizations that support abortion rights; a regulation to bar Planned Parenthood and other organizations that provide abortions from the federal family planning program, Title X; regulatory changes designed to make it easier for health care providers and employers to decline to participate in activities that violate their religious and moral beliefs; and other changes that made it harder for NIH scientists to conduct research using fetal tissue from elective abortions.
All of those policies have since been overturned by the Biden administration.
Health Insurance
Unlike Trump’s policies on reproductive health, many of his administration’s moves related to health insurance still stand.
For example, in 2020, Trump signed into law the No Surprises Act, a bipartisan measure aimed at protecting patients from unexpected medical bills stemming from payment disputes between health care providers and insurers. The bill was included in the $900 billion covid relief package he opposed before signing, though Trump had expressed support for ending surprise medical bills.
His administration also pushed — over the vehement objections of health industry officials — price transparency regulations that require hospitals to post prices and insurers to provide estimated costs for procedures. Those requirements also remain in place, although hospitals in particular have been slow to comply.
Medicaid
While first-time candidate Trump vowed not to cut popular entitlement programs like Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security, his administration did not stick to that promise. The Affordable Care Act repeal legislation Trump supported in 2017 would have imposed major cuts to Medicaid, and his Department of Health and Human Services later encouraged states to require Medicaid recipients to prove they work in order to receive health insurance.
Drug Prices
One of the issues the Trump administration was most active on was reducing the price of prescription drugs for consumers — a top priority for both Democratic and Republican voters. But many of those proposals were blocked by the courts.
One Trump-era plan that never took effect would have pegged the price of some expensive drugs covered by Medicare to prices in other countries. Another would have required drug companies to include prices in their television advertisements.
A regulation allowing states to import cheaper drugs from Canada did take effect, in November 2020. However, it took until January 2024 for the FDA, under Trump’s successor, to approve the first importation plan, from Florida. Canada has said it won’t allow exports that risk causing drug shortages in that country, leaving unclear whether the policy is workable.
Trump also signed into law measures allowing pharmacists to disclose to patients when the cash price of a drug is lower than the cost using their insurance. Previously pharmacists could be barred from doing so under their contracts with insurers and pharmacy benefit managers.
Veterans’ Health
Trump is credited by some advocates for overhauling Department of Veterans Affairs health care. However, while he did sign a major bill allowing veterans to obtain care outside VA facilities, White House officials also tried to scuttle passage of the spending needed to pay for the initiative.
Medical Freedom
Trump scored a big win for the libertarian wing of the Republican Party when he signed into law the “Right to Try Act,” intended to make it easier for patients with terminal diseases to access drugs or treatments not yet approved by the FDA.
But it is not clear how many patients have managed to obtain treatment using the law because it is aimed at the FDA, which has traditionally granted requests for “compassionate use” of not-yet-approved drugs anyway. The stumbling block, which the law does not address, is getting drug companies to release doses of medicines that are still being tested and may be in short supply.
Trump said in a Jan. 10 Fox News town hall that the law had “saved thousands and thousands” of lives. There’s no evidence for the claim.
KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF—an independent source of health policy research, polling, and journalism. Learn more about KFF.
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How Too Much Salt May Lead To Organ Failure
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Salt’s Health Risks… More Than Just Heart Disease!
It’s been well-established for a long time that too much salt is bad for cardiovascular health. It can lead to high blood pressure, which in turn can lead to many problems, including heart attacks.
A team of researchers has found that in addition to this, it may be damaging your organs themselves.
This is because high salt levels peel away the surfaces of blood vessels. How does this harm your organs? Because it’s through those walls that nutrients are selectively passed to where they need to be—mostly your organs. So, too much salt can indirectly starve your organs of the nutrients they need to survive. And you absolutely do not want your organs to fail!
❝We’ve identified new biomarkers for diagnosing blood vessel damage, identifying patients at risk of heart attack and stroke, and developing new drug targets for therapy for a range of blood vessel diseases, including heart, kidney and lung diseases as well as dementia❞
~ Newman Sze, Canada Research Chair in Mechanisms of Health and Disease, and lead researcher on this study.
See the evidence for yourself: Endothelial Damage Arising From High Salt Hypertension Is Elucidated by Vascular Bed Systematic Profiling
Diets high in salt are a huge problem in Canada, North America as a whole, and around the world. According to a World Health Organization (WHO) report released March 9, Canadians consume 9.1 grams of salt per day.
Read: WHO global report on sodium intake reduction
You may be wondering: who is eating over 9g of salt per day?
And the answer is: mostly, people who don’t notice how much salt is already in processed foods… don’t see it, and don’t think about it.
Meanwhile, the WHO recommends the average person to consume no more than five grams, or one teaspoon, of salt per day.
Read more: Massive efforts needed to reduce salt intake and protect lives
The American Heart Association, tasked with improving public health with respect to the #1 killer of Americans (it’s also the #1 killer worldwide—but that’s not the AHA’s problem), goes further! It recommends no more than 2.3g per day, and ideally, no more than 1.5g per day.
Some handy rules-of-thumb
Here are sodium-related terms you may see on food packages:
- Salt/Sodium-Free = Less than 5mg of sodium per serving
- Very Low Sodium = 35mg or less per serving
- Low Sodium = 140mg or less per serving
- Reduced Sodium = At least 25% less sodium per serving than the usual sodium level
- Light in Sodium or Lightly Salted = At least 50% less sodium than the regular product
Confused by milligrams? Instead of remembering how many places to move the decimal point (and potentially getting an “out by an order of magnitude error—we’ve all been there!), think of the 1.5g total allowance as being 1500mg.
See also: How much sodium should I eat per day? ← from the American Heart Association
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Brussels Sprouts vs Broccoli – Which is Healthier?
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Our Verdict
When comparing sprouts to broccoli, we picked the sprouts.
Why?
First let’s note that we have an interesting comparison today, because these two plants are the exact same species (and indeed, also the exact same species as cabbage, cauliflower. and kale)—just a different cultivar. All of these plants and more are simply cultivars of Brassica oleracea.
Them being the same species notwithstanding, there are nutritional differences:
In terms of macros, sprouts have slightly more protein, carbohydrates, and fiber, whereas broccoli has slightly more water weight. An easy win for sprouts here.
In the category of vitamins, sprouts have more of vitamins A, B1, B3, B6, C, E, and K, while broccoli has more of vitamins B2 and B5. Another easy win for sprouts.
When it comes to minerals, sprouts again lead with more copper, iron, magnesium, manganese, phosphorus, and potassium, while broccoli has more calcium and selenium.
A note on oxalates: while oxalates are not a problem for most people, it is important to be mindful of them if one has kidney problems. You may know that spinach (a fellow green vegetable high in vitamins and minerals, as well as being a fellow oleracea, albeit of a different genus, so not the same species for once) is high in oxalates, but these two Brassica oleracea we compared today are amongst the lowest in oxalates (source 1 | source 2), making them an ideal way to get vitamins, minerals, and fiber on an oxalate-controlled diet.
Since both are also high in polyphenols, especially kaempferol and quercetin, we’ll mention that sprouts have more lignans while broccoli has more flavonoids. In short: they’re both very good, just different.
As ever, enjoy both! But if you’re going to pick one for total best nutritional density, it’s sprouts.
Want to learn more?
You might like to read:
Sprout Your Seeds, Grains, Beans, Etc ← sprout your Brassica oleracea, too!
Take care!
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Can a drug like Ozempic help treat addictions to alcohol, opioids or other substances?
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Semaglutide (sold as Ozempic, Wegovy and Rybelsus) was initially developed to treat diabetes. It works by stimulating the production of insulin to keep blood sugar levels in check.
This type of drug is increasingly being prescribed for weight loss, despite the fact it was initially approved for another purpose. Recently, there has been growing interest in another possible use: to treat addiction.
Anecdotal reports from patients taking semaglutide for weight loss suggest it reduces their appetite and craving for food, but surprisingly, it also may reduce their desire to drink alcohol, smoke cigarettes or take other drugs.
But does the research evidence back this up?
Animal studies show positive results
Semaglutide works on glucagon-like peptide-1 receptors and is known as a “GLP-1 agonist”.
Animal studies in rodents and monkeys have been overwhelmingly positive. Studies suggest GLP-1 agonists can reduce drug consumption and the rewarding value of drugs, including alcohol, nicotine, cocaine and opioids.
Out team has reviewed the evidence and found more than 30 different pre-clinical studies have been conducted. The majority show positive results in reducing drug and alcohol consumption or cravings. More than half of these studies focus specifically on alcohol use.
However, translating research evidence from animal models to people living with addiction is challenging. Although these results are promising, it’s still too early to tell if it will be safe and effective in humans with alcohol use disorder, nicotine addiction or another drug dependence.
What about research in humans?
Research findings are mixed in human studies.
Only one large randomised controlled trial has been conducted so far on alcohol. This study of 127 people found no difference between exenatide (a GLP-1 agonist) and placebo (a sham treatment) in reducing alcohol use or heavy drinking over 26 weeks.
In fact, everyone in the study reduced their drinking, both people on active medication and in the placebo group.
However, the authors conducted further analyses to examine changes in drinking in relation to weight. They found there was a reduction in drinking for people who had both alcohol use problems and obesity.
For people who started at a normal weight (BMI less than 30), despite initial reductions in drinking, they observed a rebound increase in levels of heavy drinking after four weeks of medication, with an overall increase in heavy drinking days relative to those who took the placebo.
There were no differences between groups for other measures of drinking, such as cravings.
Some studies show a rebound increase in levels of heavy drinking. Deman/Shutterstock In another 12-week trial, researchers found the GLP-1 agonist dulaglutide did not help to reduce smoking.
However, people receiving GLP-1 agonist dulaglutide drank 29% less alcohol than those on the placebo. Over 90% of people in this study also had obesity.
Smaller studies have looked at GLP-1 agonists short-term for cocaine and opioids, with mixed results.
There are currently many other clinical studies of GLP-1 agonists and alcohol and other addictive disorders underway.
While we await findings from bigger studies, it’s difficult to interpret the conflicting results. These differences in treatment response may come from individual differences that affect addiction, including physical and mental health problems.
Larger studies in broader populations of people will tell us more about whether GLP-1 agonists will work for addiction, and if so, for whom.
How might these drugs work for addiction?
The exact way GLP-1 agonists act are not yet well understood, however in addition to reducing consumption (of food or drugs), they also may reduce cravings.
Animal studies show GLP-1 agonists reduce craving for cocaine and opioids.
This may involve a key are of the brain reward circuit, the ventral striatum, with experimenters showing if they directly administer GLP-1 agonists into this region, rats show reduced “craving” for oxycodone or cocaine, possibly through reducing drug-induced dopamine release.
Using human brain imaging, experimenters can elicit craving by showing images (cues) associated with alcohol. The GLP-1 agonist exenatide reduced brain activity in response to an alcohol cue. Researchers saw reduced brain activity in the ventral striatum and septal areas of the brain, which connect to regions that regulate emotion, like the amygdala.
In studies in humans, it remains unclear whether GLP-1 agonists act directly to reduce cravings for alcohol or other drugs. This needs to be directly assessed in future research, alongside any reductions in use.
Are these drugs safe to use for addiction?
Overall, GLP-1 agonists have been shown to be relatively safe in healthy adults, and in people with diabetes or obesity. However side effects do include nausea, digestive troubles and headaches.
And while some people are OK with losing weight as a side effect, others aren’t. If someone is already underweight, for example, this drug might not be suitable for them.
In addition, very few studies have been conducted in people with addictive disorders. Yet some side effects may be more of an issue in people with addiction. Recent research, for instance, points to a rare risk of pancreatitis associated with GLP-1 agonists, and people with alcohol use problems already have a higher risk of this disorder.
Other drugs treatments are currently available
Although emerging research on GLP-1 agonists for addiction is an exciting development, much more research needs to be done to know the risks and benefits of these GLP-1 agonists for people living with addiction.
In the meantime, existing effective medications for addiction remain under-prescribed. Only about 3% of Australians with alcohol dependence, for example, are prescribed medication treatments such as like naltrexone, acamprosate or disulfiram. We need to ensure current medication treatments are accessible and health providers know how to prescribe them.
Continued innovation in addiction treatment is also essential. Our team is leading research towards other individualised and effective medications for alcohol dependence, while others are investigating treatments for nicotine addiction and other drug dependence.
Read the other articles in The Conversation’s Ozempic series here.
Shalini Arunogiri, Addiction Psychiatrist, Associate Professor, Monash University; Leigh Walker, , Florey Institute of Neuroscience and Mental Health, and Roberta Anversa, , The University of Melbourne
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
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How extreme heat can affect you—and how you can protect yourself
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Because of climate change, last summer was the hottest in the Northern Hemisphere in 2,000 years—and this summer is expected to be even hotter. The record may continue to be broken: Extreme heat is expected to become even more frequent.
The scorching heat has led to an increase in heat-related deaths in the United States, according to the Department of Health and Human Services, with approximately 2,300 deaths in the summer of 2023. Extreme heat, defined as a period of two to three days with high heat and humidity with temperatures above 90 degrees Fahrenheit, can have serious health consequences, including symptoms like headache, dizziness, loss of consciousness, nausea, and confusion.
As we face more extreme heat, you may be wondering how you can protect yourself and your loved ones. Read on to learn about heat-related illness, who’s most at risk, and more.
What happens when our bodies are exposed to extreme heat?
As our body temperature rises, our bodies attempt to cool down by opening up more blood vessels near the skin to begin sweating. The evaporation of our sweat regulates our body temperature, but it also leads to losing fluids and minerals.
When it’s too humid, sweating alone doesn’t do the trick. The heart must work harder to bring blood around the body. It starts beating faster, which can cause light-headedness, nausea, and headache.
This process can affect our health in different ways, including increasing our risk of hospitalization for heart disease, worsening asthma, and injuring kidneys due to dehydration. It can also result in heat-related illness. Below are some effects of heat on our bodies:
- Heat cramps: Occur when a person loses salt through sweating, which causes painful cramps. Symptoms begin as painful spasms after heavy sweating, usually in the legs or the stomach. Heat cramps can lead to heat exhaustion or heat stroke.
- Heat exhaustion: This occurs when the body loses an excessive amount of water and salt, usually during intense physical activity. Symptoms include irritability, heavy sweating, and weakness, including muscle cramps. Heat exhaustion can lead to heat stroke.
- Heat stroke: This is the most severe heat-related illness. It happens when the body can’t cool down and reaches a temperature of 106 Fahrenheit or higher within 10 to 15 minutes. If the person doesn’t receive emergency treatment, it can cause permanent disability or death. Symptoms include confusion, loss of consciousness, and seizures.
What should I do if someone experiences a heat-related illness?
If you or someone you’re with begins to show signs of heat illness, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends the following:
- Heat cramps: Stop all physical activity, drink water or a sports drink, move to a cool place, and wait for cramps to go away before resuming activity. If the cramps last more than an hour, you’re on a low-sodium diet, or you have heart problems, get medical help.
- Heat exhaustion: Move the person to a cool place, loosen their clothes, use a cool bath or cloths to try to lower their body temperature, and give them a sip of water. If the person throws up, or if their symptoms last longer than an hour or worsen, get medical help.
- Heat stroke: Call 911 immediately. Then, move the person to a cooler place, use cool cloths or a cool bath to help lower their temperature, and don’t give them anything to drink.
Read more about heat-related illness and what to do in each case.
Who’s more vulnerable to extreme heat?
While everyone can be affected by extreme heat, some people are more at risk, including people of color.
A 2023 KFF report outlined that because of historical residential segregation in the U.S. (known as “redlining”), people of color are more likely to live in areas that experience higher temperatures from rooftops, asphalt, and sidewalks that retain the sun’s heat (known as the “urban heat island effect”). Additionally, communities of color are more likely to live in areas with fewer trees, which act as a canopy and provide shade, making the heat worse and more direct.
Children under 5, adults 65 or over, and pregnant people are also more vulnerable to extreme heat. If you have a chronic health condition like diabetes, heart problems, or a mental health condition, you’re also at higher risk. (Some psychiatric medications, like antidepressants, can also make people more susceptible to heat).
Lastly, anyone exposed to the sun and extreme heat for long periods is also at higher risk. This includes athletes, people who work outdoors, and unhoused people.
What can I do to prevent heat-related illness during a heat wave?
During a heat wave, follow these tips to stay cool and protect yourself from heat-related illness:
- Never leave your pets or children inside a car.
- Wear loose, light-colored clothing (dark colors absorb more heat).
- Find shade if you’re outside.
- If you don’t have air conditioning in your home, go to a place where you can cool down, such as a local library, community center, local pool or splash pad, or mall. Check to see if your city has designated cooling centers. (Cities like New York have a list of places.)
- Wear a hat.
- Drink (non-alcoholic) fluids often to stay hydrated—and if you have pets, give them water frequently as well.
- Check on your family members or older neighbors who may be more sensitive to extreme heat.
- Avoid using your stove or oven too often or during the hottest parts of the day.
- Cover your windows with shades to keep the heat out.
What are some resources to prevent heat-related illness?
If you need financial assistance to cool down your home, such as to purchase an air conditioner, apply to the federal government’s Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program.
Before you head outside during a heat wave, use the CDC’s HeatRisk tool: Enter your zip code to find the current heat risk in your area and get tips on what to do to stay safe with each risk level.
During a heat wave, also look for a cooling center in your state using the National Center for Healthy Housing’s list.
Check out the National Weather Service’s for more tips and resources.
For more information, talk to your health care provider.
This article first appeared on Public Good News and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
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