[박효순의 건강직설]
Entered 2023.11.05 15:20 Views 0 Entered 2023.11.05 15:20 Modified 2023.11.05 10:51 Views 0 Participants are chatting at the ‘2023 Minister of Health and Welfare Baduk Tournament’ held at Jongno Giwon on the 4th. This competition resumed four years after COVID-19. Reporter Park Hyo-soon
As soon as I opened the door and walked in, I heard ‘knock knock, knock knock, knock knock…’ ‘ The sound repeats cheerfully. Elderly people in their 60s and 70s are busy chatting with each other. Most of them are men, but in rare cases, there are also women. The sight of them staring at the checkerboard and making moves one by one is truly ‘serious’ itself.
This is the afternoon scene at Jongno Giwon (Gwansu-dong, Jongno-gu) near Jongno 3-ga Station on the Seoul Subway on the 4th. On this day, the ‘2023 Minister of Health and Welfare Baduk Competition’ was held in the special game room. It is a baduk event hosted by the ‘Bosagiwoohoe (Chairman Ahn Jeong-in)’, which is run mainly by retirees from the Ministry of Health and Welfare and the Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service (HIRA). The Bossagi Association, which was formed in the early 1980s (then under the Ministry of Health and Social Affairs), has been holding the Ministry of Health and Welfare Minister’s Baduk Tournament once or twice a year, but it was suspended due to the COVID-19 pandemic and resumed the tournament after four years. Two trophies will be awarded by the Minister of Health and Welfare, one for the winner of grade 3 or higher and one for the winner of grade 4 or lower.
On this day, the competition was attended by Shin Eon-hang, current chairman of the Health Insurance Dispute Mediation Committee, who served as Vice Minister of Health and Welfare, Director of HIRA, and Director of the Children’s Rights Guarantee; Hong Yeon-tak, Chairman of Withfarm (Ph.D. in Pharmacy), who made a name for himself as Director of the Contracts Department; About 30 people attended, including Rain Association Advisor), Rain Association President Ahn Jung-in, and Secretary General Kim Chun-nyeon. A member born in 1936 (actually 34 years old), who is looking into his 90s, also attended and continued to compete with his juniors. Seo Hyo-seok, Shin Eon-hang, and Hong Soon-cheol (honorific names omitted, in order of kanana) are all the same age, born in 1946, are 77 years old this year, and are high-level players with skills of 5 to 6 dan in Ama Baduk (Korean origins). They have a reputation for having the concentration, determination, and stamina to not lose even when playing baduk with people in their 50s or 60s.
What the attendees unanimously told reporters on this day was that “Baduk is good for preventing dementia.” Chairman Shin Eon-hang said, “If I write an article on the topic of baduk and dementia prevention, it will attract a lot of attention.”
Korea’s recent elderly dementia rate is 10.33%, with 1 in 10 elderly people suffering from dementia, and 4 out of 10 elderly people aged 85 or older are known to have dementia. At the end of last year, the number of patients registered in dementia relief centers operated by 256 local governments across the country was 533,959. Social costs due to dementia are also gradually increasing, reaching 17.7 trillion won in 2020, and are predicted to exceed 100 trillion won in 2050.
Nationally, various measures and projects are being developed to prevent dementia. In particular, experts say that if Baduk is fostered as a brain sport for older people, it can be effectively used to prevent dementia. The Korean Senior Citizens Association (Chairman Kim Ho-il) has also recently been actively carrying out a national campaign to prevent dementia through baduk. In conjunction with the Gangnam-gu Dementia Relief Center (Center Director Seo Sang-won, Professor of Neurology, Samsung Seoul Hospital), an event was held on September 6th at the Gangnam-gu Community Center to raise awareness of the importance of dementia prevention and awareness-raising, with over 500 seniors participating. On April 26th of this year, a similar campaign was held at Sarang Church with about 500 seniors participating. At both events, experts gave lectures on how dance and baduk help improve physical health and stimulate brain activity.
Seo Hyo-seok, an oriental medicine doctor who is a ‘dementia prevention advisor’ for the Korean Senior Citizens’ Association, is attracting attention by actively promoting ‘dementia prevention through baduk’ through various media interviews as well as a national dementia prevention campaign. He is also working hard to promote ‘easy Go’, which anyone can easily learn, by reducing and improving the game of Baduk, which requires a high level of brain activity and concentration, from 19 lines -19 lines to 13 lines -13 lines. am.
The only sport where people in their 80s and 90s can beat people in their 20s and 40s is baduk. It is said that among Korean professional drivers, there is not a single dementia patient. There is also a paper that proves the effectiveness of baduk. A research team at Seoul National University published a paper comparing the brains of a group that played baduk and a group that did not, and found that playing baduk activates the amygdala and frontal lobe, which control emotional processing and intuitive judgment. Advisor Seo said, “As a result of nearly 10 years of research follow-up, various research studies have proven that playing Baduk diligently can prevent dementia by changing the brain structure,” and added, “Through EasyJigo, our goal is to learn Baduk in your 60s and prevent dementia in your 70s.” “We are doing it,” he said.
While walking back and forth for over 4 hours not only at the 2023 Ministry of Health and Welfare Minister’s Baduk Tournament but also around Jongro Station, an idea occurred to the reporter. It is about the dissemination and popularization of 13-line Baduk. The senior center was chosen as a way to use Baduk to prevent dementia.
Currently, hundreds of senior citizen centers are operated in each local government in Korea. The facility is built by the Ministry of Public Administration and Security, and each city, county, and district is responsible for its operation. There are about 65,000 senior citizen centers nationwide, and the number of members who join them reaches 3 million. It is not easy to learn new 19-line baduk in old age. If you do not play properly and quickly, it is also called ‘seniority party baduk’. However, the reporter believes that 13-line Baduk will be able to become established in senior centers without difficulty.
2023-11-05 06:21:18
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