A World Health Organisation (WHO) Country Representative, Mrs Sherifat Lawal, has restated the essence and benefits of exercises to senior citizens, saying that it could help reduce non-communicable diseases.
Lawal made the assertion in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Sunday while reflecting on the walk for the elderly in Lagos, tagged “Walk for Life.
NAN reports that the health support initiative was put together by a Non-Governmental Agency (NGO), Charity Organisation for the Welfare of Aged People (COWAP).
The initiative was supported by the World Health Organisation (WHO), Nigerian Army, 81 Battalion, Lagos, Lagos East and Lagos West Local Government Councils among others.
The participants in the walk for life were elders within the ages of 50 years for women and 60 years for the men, an event which had about 200 participants.
The three kilometre walk started at Apongbon Bridge and ended at the Freedom Park, Lagos Island after which participants received free medical checkup provided by the Army.
The WHO personnel, Lawal urged the senior citizens to ensure regular exercise which could help in reducing non-communicable diseases and sustain a healthy life.
“There is need to encourage the senior citizens to imbibe the culture of regular exercises to keep them away from non-communicable diseases. This is very important.
“Most of the aged ones in the country are not giving the opportunity to exercise; they are left to stay indoors thereby exposing them to some non-communicable diseases.
“Not having regular exercise can lead to having non-communicable diseases like Diabetes, Hypertension, Arthritis and others. If these aged ones are not made to walk around they tend to build up these diseases over time.
“There should be a time when the aged ones are made to walk about, relax their muscles and maybe with light exercises to relax their nerves and also straighten their bones,’’ she said.
Lawal said that allowing the aged to be inactive might lead to hypertension, noting that there was a need to urgently address how the elderly were catered for to help them live longer.
“We need to have a redress on our disposition to the health of the elders, before they get to the advanced age, they should have been helped to engage in some light physical activities.
“Activities like light walk because if they are left inactive, they tend to develop hypertension, elders should not be left alone without proper care and light walk, it will help them a lot.
“It is not about how old they are, the question is if they are in good health which can be facilitated by helping them to have exercises according to their capacity.
“Regular exercises have a lot of positive impact on the health of those that are advancing in age. This is what we should look at and not buying them medications that simple exercises will suffice for,’’ she said.