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Comment by TomVDB | Hacker News Reader

I was wondering about the exercising part: do I need to feel guilty about going out for a run or a bike ride (by myself, of course) ?

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In Italy, they've actually banned bike riding as a training activity since you're not supposed to go far from home, and out of an abundance of caution: if you hurt yourself you might be tying up desperately needed medical services, and also going near the hospitals full of COVID-19 patients.

Seems like it'd be a good idea to limit really big, difficult workouts in order to not tire yourself out too much, and probably stay close to home as well.

Good point. I didn’t consider the getting injured aspect of it.

Did they also ban driving? It's a lot more dangerous than riding a bike.

They're talking about bike riding for fun/training, not as transportation.

That's not true: driving results in between 3 and 12 times fewer deaths per passenger-mile than cycling, depending on your methodology. [0]. Even if you take it to be only 3x and compare per passenger-hour rather than per passenger-mile, which nobody ever does, you would find they are roughly equally dangerous.

[0] https://bicycleuniverse.com/bicycle-safety-almanac/

If you subtract all the cyclists who are hit by cars from those statistics, then cycling is orders of magnitude safer. It's only dangerous when there are cars on the road.

If you're the only car on the road, it's substantially safer too. The roads won't be completely empty of cars during the lockdown.

They've been pretty empty so far. It's probably the safest time to use the roads in the area right now.

Like I wrote in the other comment, you can ride your bike to work/the grocery store in Italy, just not go for training rides.

If you want to really start factoring stuff in to how healthy or not it is, you should factor in the sedentary lifestyle that too much driving leads to, as well.

> Even if you take it to be only 3x and compare per passenger-hour rather than per passenger-mile, which nobody ever does

But driver-hours (definitely not passenger-hours) are the correct metric if you're considering biking as a substitute for driving. People take longer trips in cars than they do on bikes because they can. If the mode of transportation shifts, trips to the store won't get longer to adjust -- the stores will become more dense to accommodate the reality that people need closer stores.

That makes sense if we're talking about long-term changes and not temporary public health measures during a pandemic.

For commuting, passenger-mile is important. And that's a vital part of why cities want to increase the share of cycling, to solve traffic during rush hour.

> For commuting, passenger-mile is important.

No, it's not, that's what I'm saying here. The length of a commute is determined by the cost it imposes on the commuter. That cost is measured in time and money, but not in distance. Nobody cares about distance. Commutes are the length they are because that's what people can tolerate. If you slowed everybody down, they wouldn't spend more time commuting; they'd commute for the same time over less distance.

Holy crap. I’ve been in Beijing for the last month and even they didn’t ban bike riding.

"Even" Beijing didn't ban bike riding? Who's more likely to ban bike riding: the place where bikes are a vital form of everyday transportation, or the place where they're a weird recreational activity?

In Italy, they're both a vital form of everyday transportation, and a very popular - and fairly working class - recreational activity

But I believe Italy didn't ban it for commuting?

Staying active is probably good for your immune system. At least that's how I'm going to rationalize it :)

This is just what the science tells us, no rationalization required!

Everyone should exercise, sleep, and eat right to prepare for the coming battle inside our bodies :)

Heavy exercise is bad for the immune system short term. But maintaining your health with lighter sessions is probably a good idea.

Yes, but you don't have to go outside to exercise.

Plenty of exercise can be done indoors, and without any equipment either.

You could do bodyweight exercise like push-ups, L-sits, burpees, and many others without any equipment.

For a small investment you could get a couple of barbells or a pull-up bar to extend even further the number of exercises you can do indoors and in a very small space.

Jeff Cavaliere just released an excellent home training program that doesn't require any specialized equipment. He does an amazing job at explaining why you should do each exercise and provides variations for different levels of ability. The video description contains details of the program, sets & reps. Highly recommended: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vc1E5CfRfos&t=1s

Or go outside and exercise without feeling guilty. Being outside is important to your mental and physical health.

Going outside could also be detrimental to your health. Humans are not so weak they can’t stay inside for a few weeks. Please do us all a favor and take this seriously. I promise you won’t die from staying inside for 3 weeks.

The order says that one can go outside.

Same response as the other one you commented on.

> Staying active is probably good for your immune system. At least that's how I'm going to rationalize it :)

If we're facing a serious medical crisis, please don't rationalize any potentially risky behavior. Use your best dispassionate judgement instead.

I’m glad your comment is being downvoted. Panicking, moralizing commentary like yours does absolutely no good to anybody and just stokes people’s fear.

The main focus of my comment was this: If you catch yourself rationalizing, it's a sign that something is suspect in your thinking process. Deciding to ignore those misgivings is foolish, especially in important matters.

Deciding which particular activities are too risky in this situation is left as an exercise to the reader.

> Panicking, moralizing commentary like yours does absolutely no good to anybody and just stokes people’s fear.

My comment was not panicking. However, if advocating that adults think clearly and avoid rationalization counts as "moralizing", then guilty as charged.

People not taking this seriously and staying inside is what causes this to spread. Putting yourself in risky situations does no good to anyone either and just creates a better environment for a virus to propagate.

The order says that one can go outside -- why are you trying to contradict that?

Why are you trying risky behavior? Is it so hard to stay indoors to avoid spreading the virus further? Do we focus on doing the bare minimum here?

SF Bicycle Coalition is suggesting that it's fine: https://twitter.com/sfbike/status/1239658920718643200

I’m sure they’re experts in this area and definitely an authority on the matter. SF has a massive homeless problem, how “happy” do you think that virus is in the city atm?

I think the responsible thing to do is limit yourself to minimal risk activities s.a jogging. You do not want to find yourself seeking medical care.

How would you feel about an infected person running around breathing all over the place? Other people don't know your health status.

That would be the idea of making them wear a mask when they go out in public.

They would most likely be fine. People who know more about medical stuff than random HN posters say it is perfectly fine to walk or run outside. So do it. It is good for your mental and physical health.

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