Six hours of bushwalking has a powerful immune boosting effect according to Japanese research. They actually found that communing with nature, increased cancer fighting natural killer cells. They also found that bushwalking is a natural stress reliever, helping alleviate depression and anxiety as well as decreasing blood pressure.
The leading researcher, Yoshifumi Miyazaki, found that the stress hormone cortisol was 13.4% lower in those who gazed on forest scenery for 20 minutes than in people who stayed in the city. Maybe the scenery on the computer screen doesn’t count!
Immune boosting bushwalking on a country weekend
Another study, in which people spent two nights at a hotel in the country and went bushwalking for three leisurely strolls while they were there, showed that the cancer-fighting part of their immune system increased.
The author of the study, Li Qing of Tokyo’s Nippon Medical School, also noted that the increase could still be observed 30 days later.
The old fashioned advice of “get some fresh air” turns out to be good advice. It’s a combination of the smell of the trees, listening to the birds, and the feel of sunshine through the leaves. They all have a calming effect, says Miyazaki. After all, he points out, humans lived in nature for several million years. “We were made to fit a natural environment, so we feel stress in an urban area.” Miyazaki believes that ”when we are exposed to nature, our bodies go back to the way they should be.”
They started to call it Forest therapy, to describe the practice of spending time in nature with the intention of connecting with it in a way that invites healing. It involves taking the time to experience nature with the five senses of sight, hearing, taste, smell and touch and giving the forest access to our emotional, physical, psychological, and spiritual being.
Forest Therapy
The research about Forest Therapy was embraced by the Japanese government and citizens alike. In 2006, a government-affiliated organization began designating certain forests ‘Forest Therapy bases.’
Forest Bathing/ Therapy bases are maintained by local governments. At some of them, visitors can take a guided walk with experts on forests and health care. At one base, medical checkups among the cypress trees are offered to visitors for free every Thursday. And some companies are even including forest therapy in their employee health care programs.
The over 300 year old Kiso Natural Cypress Forest is where Forest Bathing originated.
Wellbeing is absolutely boosted by 120 minutes a week in nature
So in the past it was thought that six hours of bushwalking was the necessary amount of time to have a powerful immune boosting effect. But recent forest therapy research finds that even 120 minutes a week in nature is a good amount of time. There is a thorough summary of all this research (UK 2019), in which they declare definitively that the greater your exposure to the outside (in the bush, parks or the ocean) you will have better health and well-being (at least among certain populations such as high income, largely urbanised, societies.)
It does not matter how the 120 mins of contact a week was achieved (e.g. one long vs. several shorter visits/week).
Lots of different research in adults has found various levels of benefit namely: living in greener parts of cities equates to lower probabilities of cardiovascular disease, obesity, diabetes, asthma hospitalisation, mental distress, and then mortality. In children there are lower risks of obesity and myopia.
More neighbourhood nature also means that when people are reporting about their own levels of wellbeing they say they feel better in themselves. But there are also improved birth outcomes, and cognitive development, in children. Wow.
It seems obvious that bushwalking promotes well-being, but it’s also great that research is being done on such a free-of-side-effects therapy. With concrete evidence of bushwalking having an immune boosting effect and wellbeing boosting effect, the enormous value of our Australian bush may be appreciated by more people. But just being in nature by going to a park also has a good effect. Let’s add it to our prescriptions.
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