You want more? |
If
the medical profession is to be believed, then at some time in the
future we are going to die and it is all our fault. Apparently we,
the great uneducated, are failing to listen to the gods of medicine
and as a result we are all going to suffer a slow, painful and
undignified demise. In the past month or so the prophets of medical
doom have told us that there is no safe level of alcohol consumption,
that we should stop eating copious amounts of sugar and fatty foods,
we should stand up at our desks rather than sit down, we should
exercise more, sleep less and avoid any activity more dangerous than
doing the daily crossword. Now we are told that there is no such
thing as a safe suntan. Any exposure that turns our skin a single
shade darker, we are told, risks gigantic lumps of malignant
melanomas bursting out all over the place. This advice is all due to
the fact that the very clever people in white coats have noticed that
skin cancer is on the rise and it's all due to the fact that we are
heading off once a year to hot climates and vegetating on the beach.
Such behaviour, the medics advise, is wholly irresponsible and we
must stop it immediately.
Oddly
this advice is nothing new. For years we have been told of the
dangers of sunbathing, how getting sunburn is painful, ugly and how
wanting that year round tanned look risks long term damage to the
skin including premature ageing and that disease of modernity –
cancer. Years ago the Australian government, worried about rising
cases of skin cancer, even instigated an advertising campaign that
told everyone to slip, slop, slap. Slip on a shirt, slop on the sun
lotion and slap on a hat. That advice was adopted and regurgitated by
governments around the world and in simple terms we were all told to
cover up, stay indoors and only to come out when it was dark. The
result, we all developed Vitamin D deficiency. Unbelievably,
Rickets, a disease of the nineteenth century, is making a comeback in
the UK and the clever people in white coats are dishing out Vitamin D
supplements like... Well... Like pills! Apparently then, the high priests
of health have decided that the only way we should enjoy a bit of
sunshine on our holidays is to sit beneath a large impermeable
umbrella, five inches of sunscreen smothering every millimetre of
skin and a bowl of concentrated vitamin D pills readily at hand.
Sounds fun doesn't it?
Of
course you could take such advice with a pinch of salt and instead
opt to use your own common sense. Getting drunker than a judge every
day is a pretty silly thing to do but having a glass of red wine here
and there or even the odd beer is unlikely to make your liver
explode. Likewise a McDonald’s hamburger every now and then is
pretty harmless but eat one or two a day and you are going to get
very fat and your arteries are likely to turn to stone. Equally doing
any regular exercise that gets you sweating and your heart pumping is
a very good thing but over do it by trying to run a marathon twice a
week and there's a good chance your hip joints will turn to dust and
your heart will go bang. In short, the medics with their double blind
studies and drug company literature, always seem to go overboard with their
advice but that doesn't mean we should go overboard with our
response. Everything we do has some inherent risk attached but the
saying “all in moderation” is as true today as it was when we
stopped sending children up chimneys and down coal mines.
Take
snorkelling for example. Going into the sea with a mask, snorkel and
flippers and you risk drowning, hypothermia, bumps, grazes, sunburn,
urchin spine injuries, coral scrapes and, in some places, even shark
attacks. And yet with a little common sense these risks can by
mitigated. You can avoid drowning by being able to swim and knowing
when the water is too rough for you. To avoid hypothermia wear a
wetsuit and limit your time in the water. Sunburn is avoided by
wearing a rash vest and both a wetsuit and a vest will give
protection against stings and scrapes. And of course not provoking
the more agile and toothy of the sea critters is always a good idea.
None of these little tips require you to have an advanced degree or need testing under laboratory conditions, they are simple common sense advice.
So
go out and enjoy your holiday this year. Get a bit of vitamin D
producing sun on your back, have the odd beer, enjoy the local
cuisine and of course, go snorkelling, freediving and bubble blowing
if that's your thing, safe in the knowledge that even if doctors
followed every single piece of their own advice, they
will still die like everyone else it's just they would have missed
out on living on the way.
For more common sense tips check out our snorkelling hazards page
No comments:
Post a Comment