Anyone who came home exhausted last summer in the heat, perhaps unable to sleep at night and possibly struggling with circulatory problems, knows that too much heat is unhealthy.
But did you know that heat makes you fat?
This is one of the assumptions scientists make when it comes to the consequences of climate change.
The renowned specialist magazine Lancet showed how dangerous heat is for health. Studies have found that diabetes and its associated consequences, such as obesity, are one of the issues that increase in hot weather and therefore also as a result of climate change. In recent years, there has been an increasing number of studies examining the influence of temperature on the body.
Focus on sugar and fat metabolism
The scientists are primarily concerned with sugar and fat metabolism. Why? The area in the body that is responsible for thermoregulation also plays a role in sugar and fat metabolism.
When it’s hot, our brown – the “good” – fatty tissue no longer functions properly. This is actually responsible for burning off excess energy from food and converting it into heat. What happens? We store the energy as depot fat, become fatter and at some point – sooner rather than later – develop secondary diseases such as diabetes. With current global warming, that could mean more weight and less health.
When brown fat has nothing left to do
In addition, rooms are often overheated in winter and, even in the cold season, hardly anyone is exposed to cooler temperatures.
This means that the temperature-regulating system is no longer trained and does not consume any energy.
The brown fat no longer has anything to do, so to speak, and gradually – even as you get older – it becomes less and less.
Incidentally, brown fat also gets its name from the fact that it appears brown in imaging procedures because, compared to white fat, it contains many mitochondria – numerous power plants in the cells. They are responsible for burning energy. When you need them. Less so in the heat.
If the temperatures continue to rise, the risk of heat becoming a figure-killer also increases.
The good news
You can do something about it. Cooling helps. This improves sugar and fat metabolism. This also helps the figure.
