“The key is just to treat your staff how you would like to be treated yourself. You should treat your employees like the smart and capable adults they are. Give them the choice to make informed decisions and you will cultivate an environment in which everyone can flourish.”
— Richard Branson
Founder of Virgin Group & British Billionaire Entrepreneur

The quote archive

Health

A growing archive of 3,000+ moments, drawn from every interview.

When we're in this situation, under all these restrictions and lockdowns, our emotions have been dialled down. We can't spend our emotional energy on the things we normally would- like having friends over for dinner. We have to be good citizens, and music gives us a place to put that energy.

— Sophie Ellis-Bextor

British Pop Singer & "Murder on the Dancefloor" Artist

We're outnumbered by bacteria 1.3:1, we're slightly more bacteria than we are human. We're also stardust. We are also 60% water, and that water in our bodies is billions of years old. At an atomic level, 98% of the hydrogen in our bodies came from the bigbang. We're incredibly ancient beings, perhaps we should see ourselves as aliens!

— Ziya Tong

Canadian science broadcaster and host of Discovery Channel's Daily Planet

In 2012, I was put to the forefront of people's eyes during the Olympics. It was the first time I'd been on the cover of a magazine- and it wasn't about being a size-zero or really-skinny, it was about being strong and promoting what healthy looks like.

— Dame Jessica Ennis-Hill

British Olympic heptathlon champion and gold medalist

There's so much data that's been collected around fitness, but a lot of this has been based on male subjects and isn't always right to apply to women. Having been through the journey myself, I want to help more women become body-literate and motivated to enjoy exercise.

— Dame Jessica Ennis-Hill

British Olympic heptathlon champion and gold medalist

When you think you're at 100% of your physical or mental capacity, you're not. We have enormous reserves within us (which we don't tap into for good reason), but we are all capable of pushing ourselves a lot further than we think.

— Tim Peake

British Astronaut & ISS Expedition Commander

Loneliness is thought to be as bad for our health as smoking 15 cigarettes per day. If you're lonely, you have a 32% higher chance of getting a stroke, a 29% higher chance of having heart disease and 30% higher chance of dying prematurely.

— Noreena Hertz

Economist & Author on Globalization, Corporate Power & Digital Society

Whether it's real-life viruses, or dangerous ideas, they tend to be spread by super spreaders. We know that 20% of infected people do 80% of the spreading of COVID-19. We also know that on Facebook, there is a relatively identifiable cohort of super spreaders of disinformation and misinformation.

— Niall Ferguson

British historian and author specializing in financial and military history

If you have a doctor who is very ready to find people as having heart disease, and thus overdiagnoses and overtreats them – that's a mistake, risks safety and wastes resources. Similarly, if you have a doctor down the hall who underdiagnoses, that endangers lives.

— Cass Sunstein

Legal Scholar & White House Office of Management & Budget Administrator

Ultimately, I think we'll be able to pop a pill and reset our body's age. It takes us about 4-8 weeks currently to reset the age of a mouse, it shouldn't be any different for humans.

— David Sinclair

Longevity researcher & Harvard Medical School professor studying aging and lifespan extension

In December 2020, we published in the journal nature that we could turn on 3 genes in mice, that are normally only switched on in embryos. By doing this, we could reverse the age of complex tissues in adult mice. We used this system to restore eyesight to blind, old, mice!

— David Sinclair

Longevity researcher & Harvard Medical School professor studying aging and lifespan extension

We are literally right now living through one of the biggest revolutions in human history, certainly in medicine, and most people aren't even aware that it's about to happen.

— David Sinclair

Longevity researcher & Harvard Medical School professor studying aging and lifespan extension

Ageing is malleable, we can control it. 20% of our health in old-age is due to genetic factors, and the rest is due to our lifestyle. We can measure this clock. It's literally measuring chemicals in our own DNA.

— David Sinclair

Longevity researcher & Harvard Medical School professor studying aging and lifespan extension

My advice is to grab hold of people that are close to you and lean on them heavily. That's how we're designed to work!

— Steve Peters

Psychiatrist and author of "The Chimp Paradox

Robustness is being in a good place and having a plan, resilience is being able to implement that plan and stay in a good place.

— Steve Peters

Psychiatrist and author of "The Chimp Paradox

If you know what's inside your head and you understand its structures, rules, and functions, it avoids glitches. You can almost think of it like three sock puppets! You, this little chimp, and a computer, trying to run your life.

— Steve Peters

Psychiatrist and author of "The Chimp Paradox

With technology, we're creating a lot more hammers – and with more hammers, we're able to find more nails. The question is whether those hammers are being made for the right purposes, and whether they will serve the right purpose.

— Owase Jeelani