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Inflammation and physical education are good for you

No pain no gain?  Preliminary research implies that we may have been badly mistaken in our fight to reduce inflammation with instant pain-relief gratification, in the form of antiinflammatories such as NSAIDs (ibuprofen, Advil, etc) and corticosteroids (e.g. dexamethasone & prednisone). 

Not surprisingly, this research finds that there is actually an essential biological reason for inflammation–including the body marshaling white blood cells to jumpstart our natural healing process.  So, ironically, by aggressively fighting inflammation artificially, we may be reducing white blood cells and limiting healing: gaining short-term pain relief at the cost of long-term pain…and lifelong dependence on painkillers.


How does that relate to school health & wellness? Let me make an analogy:


By maximizing seat-time to boost reading and math test scores short-term, we have not only failed to increase test scores, but we have sacrificed our children’s long-term health. By no longer even trying to prevent unhealthy habits K-12, we end up as adults with epidemic chronic conditions and mental unwellness. Doctors then try to get their adult patients to make “lifestyle changes”--and those efforts fail, because no groundwork was laid in childhood. The inevitable default: multiple lifelong drug prescriptions and frequent clinical appointments to “manage” our diseases for the rest of our lives…when we could have been healthy by simply developing healthier habits in childhood. 


We are not saying that healthier habits are easy to achieve. But we are saying that it's quite feasible--once we start seriously trying. AND this is a much better alternative than the status quo.


We avoid temporary inflammation and early physical activity & education etc.–and get permanent pain and lifelong chronic conditions. No one would make either of those trade-offs, if they knew…so we are connecting the dots.

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