You can do plenty of other things good for your heart that is much less damaging to the rest of the body. Running is horrible for joints. Just walking at a brisk pace will get the heart pumping. If we want people to get more active, there are much better things to suggest that go for a run. I ran long distance all through school, and refuse to run for running's sake. Playing soccer is the only running I will do, but at least there's a purpose. Walking, swimming, riding a bike, spin class, whatever are much easier suggestions for couch potatoes to start with
I always wonder about survivorship bias in studies correlating exercise and health. Someone with joint trouble isn't able to run much, for example. It filters those people out. No doubt there are real benefits, but simple correlation will always have that problem.
tell that to my knees and ankles. the equipment is much better today than it was back when Moses and I were kids, but there are plenty of other ways of getting people active than jumping straight to running.
How is running bad for our joints? Maybe if you do it on concrete in a bad shoe, but the human body was literally made to run - which is very apparent from its design (our thighs are basically a spring that can “charge up” slowly in the “up” phase of running for less energy usage + no hair and improved thermodynamics (people can literally run for longer distances than most other animals with very few exceptions)), and you can even feel it yourself, like no other sport has such a short getting up to speed phase. If you start running for a week, you will already feel a huge improvement, unlike in tennis or bodybuilding where it might take months to noticeably get better.
prior to 2020, one of the perks a lot this audience had with their job was in office gyms. for the price of a decent pair of running shoes, you could afford a few months of a gym membership. you could also do jumping jacks, or any other number of at cardio exercises from plenty of places with Apple's offering just an example. i would venture a guess there are youtube channels for it as well. to say that exercise is cost prohibitive is just someone looking for excuses.
