India, July 28 -- There is no shortage of discussions surrounding poor nutrition, insufficient sleep, smoking, and stress. However, sitting rarely makes that list. This should change. One of the major health threats to people living in the contemporary society is not what they do; on the contrary, it concerns what they fail to do. They do not move enough. Modern life has quietly made it normal to spend hours sitting. We tend to remain seated at work, study, travel, watch TV, or use our smartphones. In other words, the issue is not sitting as such. The real problem is the amount of time we spend in this position.

The danger of sitting for long periods lies in its seeming innocuousness. There is nothing immediately painful about it; there ...