It is often said: golf is good for health! Just like sports in general, the small white ball has, among its many virtues, the ability to promote the health of those who practice it. The public authorities recognized this by voting, at the end of 2016, the Sports Health Prescription Law, which established physical activity as a non-drug therapy, similar to a spa treatment. For the past ten years, specialized physical activity (SPA) can be prescribed by doctors to prevent or alleviate chronic pathologies referred to as long-term conditions (LTC), as well as other health conditions or significant risk factors.
The development of “prescription sport” is far from anecdotal since, following various amendments, more than 20 million French people are potentially affected by the program today. “It is therefore a whole new sector that has developed over the past ten years, including the creation of new professions, such as the Staps license in Adapted Physical Activity and Health,” explains Dr. Yves Hervouet des Forges, a doctor at the French Golf Federation. “In clinics and hospitals, there are now these ‘APAs,’ as they are nicknamed, whose role is to administer the ‘medicine’ of SPA.”
