Upper-class Georgian and
Victorian folk – including the British royal family – are known to have
expended a lot of energy taking in the healing air of the coast. Doctors don’t
frequently prescribe travel as an alternative treatment for ailments any longer,
but they could soon well be.
As a medical researcher I’ve
always been interested in the indirect or unexpected effects of a treatment (or
policy) on physiology and psychology. For instance, it has just been reported
that increasing the taxes on packets of cigarettes decreases alcohol
consumption.
Travel has been shown – by ‘proper’
peer-reviewed experiments published in scientific journals – to have a
variety of biologically recordable benefits, in addition to more ethereal benefits
such as expanding personal horizons and reducing prejudices.
The headline grabber is that
taking an annual holiday pretty much anywhere reduces the risk of suffering a heart attack
by half. This is perhaps because travel is shown to improve the circulation of
blood around the body. Travel is also known to reduce levels of the body’s
stress markers (presumably after we’ve left the airport), and also improves how
couples feel about their marriage.
It would be easy to reel out
further advantages of travel, but I think you get the point. Travel is good for
you. Trust me, I’m a doctor.
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