• Question: what is the difference between health and fitness

    Asked by 439anta49 to Ceri, Marikka, Matt, Rob, Sally on 13 Nov 2014.
    • Photo: Robert Hampson

      Robert Hampson answered on 13 Nov 2014:

      Fitness is a term related to a task. Fitness required for the shotput is not the same as that required for rock climbing. The term fitness is also used in evolution (you may have heard the phrase “survival of the fittest”), where it is used similarly to describe how well an organism fits a certain environment.

      Health is a more broad term. Primarily, it is often defined in the negative, i.e. not being ill. However, health is much more than just not being ill I think. Its more to do with well being or human flourishing. I think being in good health requires not only the lack of disease or whatever, but also a good mindset, good family, friends and society, good food, good mood, etc.

      Hope that helps!

    • Photo: Marikka Beecroft

      Marikka Beecroft answered on 13 Nov 2014:

      Fitness is basically the condition of your body, more importantly it describes how well your body can handle physical tasks i.e. running, jumping and sports.

      Health covers a lot of things like illness or injury to your body as well as your mental and physically condition. The two overlap slightly with condition of your body, but health is just a more general term.

    • Photo: Ceri Dare

      Ceri Dare answered on 13 Nov 2014:

      The World Health Organisation has this definition of health: ‘Health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity’.
      http://www.who.int/about/definition/en/print.html

      This means that it’s not enough for people to be healthy for them just to not have an illness at the moment – it’s about helping people to be the best they can be and to be part of a society which is good for them. This is a very important idea in Public Health – it’s about making the world a better place for everyone to live.

      Fitness is usually related to being good at something in particular. So if you were a very good runner, but you were really depressed so you never left the house, you could be very fit at running but not very healthy.

    • Photo: Sally Cutler

      Sally Cutler answered on 13 Nov 2014:

      Fitness can even be used to describe microbes like fitness to survive. Generally this relates to a specific situation whilst health is a more general state of wellbeing.

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