It was only a matter of time before the greatest threats to society’s integrity took the form of a biological pandemic. While war and famine are structural issues, disease management and prevention is a direct intervention into the mechanics of evolution and how various organisms and viruses interact with the predominantly human environment that has emerged with the flourishing of civilization. Today, the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) is the latest indiscriminate biological threat, originating in the city of Wuhan in China, and quickly spreading across the world over the course of the past few months.
In an article written in Podium Runner, Amby Burfoot cites the research of exercise physiologist David Nieman in justifying the benefit of consistent moderate exercise, in this case running, as a form of disease prevention. Nieman’s research indicated that a sedentary lifestyle put one at an average infection risk, and going too hard increased infection risk. However, consistent moderate exercise brought disease risk for an individual below average. This further fed the established notion that exercise strengthens the body in ways beyond physical attributes and appearance.
What does this mean for the recreational and competitive runner? Easy to moderate mileage with minimal amounts of hard sustained intensity. Fitness can still be built through slowly and progressively increasing one’s volume of running, but running too fast for too long presents the risk of temporarily compromising the immune system making way for a potential infection. Consistent easy-moderate running presents the optimization necessary to prevent sacrificing physical fitness while meeting the social obligation of managing disease at the personal level to avoid community spread.
Running Science Expanded 