Luke O'Neill

69 trials showed definite benefit.

Another trial involving 80,000 people.

Now, whenever I see those kinds of numbers, I go, oh, there's something going on here.

That second study was 1,000 separate trials.

And both trials combined, exercise decreases symptoms of depression and anxiety as much as regular treatments.

Isn't that incredible?

And exercising in groups, it turns out, was especially good for those who suffered from depression.

And there's a social aspect there that lifts them, I guess.

Anxiety was low intensity exercises seem to benefit people with anxiety, like going for a good walk, for instance.

So, again, really strong scientific evidence that exercise can benefit people who are suffering certain mental health issues, especially depression and also anxiety.

Now, the mechanism isn't getting back to the mechanism again.

The first idea here that we're kicking around for a good 20, 30 years now is after you exercise, you make endorphins.

You may have heard of them.

They are the so-called happy hormones, right?

And we've all heard of endorphins, haven't we?

And they go up when you exercise was the claim.

And they make you feel better.

They couldn't find evidence for that, right?

They looked closely at this, measuring them in saliva and various things.

And there was no real evidence that endorphins were working in this way.