Mood booster

craigmedred.news · Feb 15, 2026 · Collected from GDELT

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News Fat-tire cyclists grab some photographs after a 10-mile, depression-stifling pedal to the Knik Glacier /Craig Medred photo Happiness is just steps away This being the “cabin fever” season in Alaska, those suffering with what were once called the “winter blues” might want to take note of a cheap and easy cure touted by a “systematic umbrella review with meta-meta-analysis” just published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine. After pooling the results from 81 previous meta-analyses and 1,079 studies on exercise, the authors – a group of scientists from Australia and the U.S. – reported finding clear evidence “that exercise-based interventions, in all formats and parameters, can help mitigate depression and anxiety symptoms across all population categories.” Exercise has long been suggested as a treatment for the type of depression known as cabin fever, winter blues or seasonal affective disorder (SAD), and the new study draws a big, thick underline beneath this advice, with the authors concluding that “the effectiveness of exercise interventions appeared comparable with pharmacological treatments and psychotherapies for managing depression and anxiety symptoms. “Given the cost-effectiveness, accessibility and additional physical health benefits of exercise, these results underscore the potential for exercise as a first-line intervention, particularly in settings where traditional mental health treatments may be less accessible or acceptable. Early interventions of exercise have been shown to enhance recovery from physiological conditions, and there is evidence that early interventions, from an age-related or diagnosis timing perspective, can support recovery from…diagnosed mental health conditions. “As exercise also stimulates neurobiological mechanisms, including increased growth of brain neurotrophins and protection against neurotoxic damage, our findings further support public health guidance beyond the immediate impact of alleviating depression and anxiety symptoms.” Public health Nowhere is public health guidance needed more than in these unUnited States where far more than 60 percent of the adult population – liberal, conservative, or apolitical – suffers from at least one chronic illness; where average lifespans are steadily slipping farther and farther behind those of the rest of the Western world; and where Rutgers University has suggested the mood is such that anger issues are spinning out of control. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) puts the percentages of Americans with chronic illnesses at 60 percent for those ages 18 to 34, rising to 75 percent for those ages 35 to 64 and hitting 90 percent for those over age 65. The CDC blames some of this on long-criticized drinking and smoking, the latter of which is thankfully in decline in this country, plus poor nutrition and lack of physical activity. There is little doubt Americans would benefit from healthier diets, but when looking at the U.S. compared to other countries, what really jumps out is the amazingly sedentary nature of the drive-everywhere nation. Americans today engage in a tiny fraction of the physical activity that shaped human evolution, and no species of mammal can escape hundreds of thousands of years of evolutionary history. Homo sapiens appear to possess psychological and physiological systems as dependent on physical activity as automobile engines are dependent on regular oil changes. And in the case of many Americans today, the oil ain’t gettin’ changed very often. The data-tracking website Statista reports that the average American was walking 4,774 steps per day in 2017, and the number is no doubt far lower now. If you travel to Europe these days, the difference between the number of people seen walking or cycling anywhere there versus the number seen in most U.S. cities slaps you in the face. Most European nations have been preaching this “active travel” means of getting about in an effort to create happy, healthier citizens and drive down the need for costly drugs and medical treatments. The U.S. has taken a different approach. A pill for that The big thing in America at this moment is the variety of GLP-1 drugs that cause people to lose weight and look better while also offering some protection against a variety of common, chronic diseases strongly linked to lack of physical activity. The downside of these drugs is that all indications are that once someone starts on them they will probably need to stay on them for life for the drugs to work effectively, and no one really knows the consequences of being on a muscle-wasting drug for life. That hasn’t stopped pharmaceutical companies from marketing the drugs as a magical bullet for the masses, as anyone who watched the Super Bowl witnessed. Danish multinational pharmaceutical Novo Nordisk used the big game to pitch its GLP-1 drug – Wegovy – with the theme that if there was a pill to help you lose weight, parallel park, become a professional wrestler, save more kittens or stop people from “being so judgy about how to lose weight…I’d take it.” Exactly how your taking a pill would work to alter the behavior of others was not explained, and the advertisement was a more than a little strange in that it involved a variety of obviously overweight actors pitching a weight-loss drug. If the drug works, shouldn’t the pitchmen and pitchwomen be a variety of formerly overweight individuals? But the best part of the commercial was actor John C. Reilly smashing into two parked cars while trying to squeeze into a too-small parking place to save needing to walk more than 10 feet to a diner and then proclaiming that “if there was a pill that could help me parallel park, I’d take it.” All of which was followed by his getting out of his dented car, now awkwardly smashed in between two other dented cars, only to ask bystanders as he walked into the restaurant, “that’s not your car, is it?” One could only wonder what those skinny, little Danes must think of Americans, although it is worth noting that the Danes aren’t as skinny as they once were. The World Obesity Forum reports that the rate of obesity in the Scandinavian country has climbed from 6.1 percent in 1987 to almost 19 percent today as Danes, like most in the Western world, become more and more sedentary. Still, compared to the U.S., Denmark’s obesity rate is less than half the obesity rate in the U.S., which varies from 41.3 percent for women to 38.4 percent for men, according to the Obesity Forum. And Denmark doesn’t have anything near the childhood obesity problem of the U.S. Obesity rates for Danish boys are about a third of those for U.S. boys, and for girls, the rate falls to about a quarter of that in this country, according to the Forum’s data. But, there’s a pill for that…. Or real solutions if America’s political leaders were only willing to embrace them. Savings all around Swiss researchers who in 2024 completed a “scoping review” of studies on the subject of active travel in Europe concluded that building sidewalks, walking paths and bike routes, and encouraging people to use them, resulted in mentally healthier citizens, physically healthier citiznes and significant reductions in spending on health care. Beyond the mental health benefits of increased physical activity, their peer-reviewed study published in Public Health Review concluded that “at the individual level, the person engaged in the active behaviour has been shown to face a significant net beneficial effect. The gain in life-years due to adoption of daily cycling habits was evaluated as nine times greater than the years of life lost due to increased exposure to pollution. The modal shift has also been reported to be clearly beneficial at the community level as well due to overall decrease in fuel-burning related pollution and noise reduction. Studies have forecast net avoided costs for the National Health Service amounting to £6 billion ($8.2 billion) within a 20-year period, and for a Stockholm county’s healthcare budget (the net benefit amounted to 8.7 percent of the initial investments on infrastructures, which were of 900€ ($1,190) per year per person….” The problem in the U.S. is that most people are addicted to motor vehicles, which contribute to both physical ill health, by causing them to sit evermore, and mental ill health due to the irritations associated with commuting in traffic-clogged urban areas. The mental health consequences of urban driving are only beginning to be thoroughly studied, but Spanish researchers in 2023 reported finding that “people who used their private, motorised transport and those who spent more time on their commute to work are associated with poorer mental health. The results of this study show that both driving a motor vehicle and commuting time are associated with poorer mental health.” A South Korean study published the same year found that drivers who spent more than an hour in traffic were 16 percent more likely to experience depressive symptoms than those with commutes under 30 minutes, according to Science Alert, which observed in reporting on that study that South Korea has some of the longest average commuting times and highest rates of depression among the nations in the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). The average 108 minutes per day spent commuting in Korea is well above the American average of 81 minutes, which is significantly above the 28 to 60 minutes averages for other OECD nations. And, of course, the U.S. has some notable hotspots, with the Anchorage Metro area presenting a prime example. The Alaska Department of Labor reports the overall, average, total, daily commute time to jobs in the state’s largest city amounts to 39 minutes per day, which is below the U.S. average. But the commute time for the large number of the Matanuska-Susitna Borough residents driving to Anchorage is almost double that number. When the Glenn Highway isn’t a snowy, slippery mess and traffic