“Sport has to be a given,” says Dr. Hanna Heikenwälder, expert in cancer prevention. She criticizes the fact that it sometimes seems as if sport requires surveillance: “Sitting around is really dangerous.”
Sport is important for cancer prevention, emphasizes Dr. Hanna Heikenwälder. “People keep asking me what sport they should do to protect themselves from cancer – and what values they should achieve on their heart rate monitor,” she says. But that’s not the issue at all: “What has to be clear to us is that sport is not the dangerous activity that requires supervision, but rather everyday life without movement,” emphasizes the expert. As a rule, long-lived people are not bodybuilders or marathon runners, but people who naturally move around a lot and, for example, work a lot and regularly in the garden or go for brisk walks several times a day. She herself jogs regularly. “But I’ve never had a heart rate monitor,” she emphasizes. “It doesn’t matter what you do, the main thing is to get your circulation going regularly: Then the heart pumps the immune cells contained in the blood throughout the body.” Her appeal: “We have to de-bureaucratize sport, so to speak! Sometimes I think that heart rate monitors and the like make sport more complicated. But exercise shouldn’t be complicated, it should be natural!”
Small steps, big impact
If you want to read more from the renowned cancer expert, you can follow her on Instagram. At @dr.hannaheikenwaelder you will find many tips on how you can take small steps to transform your everyday life so that you can reduce your risk of cancer. She has already reported in our newspapers, particularly on the problem of obesity and cancer. The problem with having a lot of extra kilos is – briefly explained – that the fat deposits cause permanently high levels of inflammation, which weaken the immune system and thus increase the risk of cancer. In addition, Dr. Hanna Heikenwälder in an article discusses which vaccinations protect against cancer and particularly addresses HPV.
