What to do to counter the danger of sitting for hours

Backaches are the most common outcome of spending hours at a desk. Here's how to prevent it while continuing to work

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The convenience of technology and a desk job comes with its own perils. Of these, sitting continuously for far too many hours (mostly in wrong positions) is too important to ignore. It is a known fact that we need to prioritise physical activities in order to stay fit, but a sizeable population works at a screen with little to no time for exercise.

As per a study by Harvard Health, sitting for 11 or more hours a day can increase the risk of premature death by 12%. Mayo Clinic says sitting for more than 8 hours a day without any physical activity poses as high a risk of death as obesity and smoking. However, it's not the number of hours we sit per day but how active we are outside of those hours that counts, believes Rishabh Malhotra, founder of the Bengaluru-based fitness start-up, Tagda Raho.

Contrary to popular belief, a 2020 study led by University of South California and published in the journal PNAS, showed that hunter-gatherer tribes sat for as many hours as we do today, shares Malhotra.

What has changed is what we do when we sit for these long hours.

"Instead of stretching, we begin our mornings by reaching for our phones and laptops, and that's where the problem begins," he notes.