Your boss says…..We are sending you to Asia for 5 days. The adventure sounds great – traveling on the company dime and experiencing a different culture all while doing what you love. But traveling across time zones can be torture. Plus you are only there for five days and it takes a day to get there! How can you be comfortable, upbeat and perform your job without being a zombie? There are so many variables that contribute to a good international trip versus a bad trip. From the airlines – delays and weather – to the passengers – cold and flu season – to jet lag – it can all be a big mess. Especially when it comes to traveling on long overseas flights, being in a metal tube for 20 hours is no picnic.

Airline travel can affect your daily health and performance. But there are a few things you can do to keep you healthy in the air and make you more comfortable when you land. Here are the top 5 travel tips from Uplift Ventures LLC.

1. Prepare before you leave – have a health kit ready and packed including your own ear buds, a blanket, some snacks (lots of snacks actually if you are traveling internationally as you never know when a delay can derail you) vitamin c if you feel any cold symptoms coming on as that can help protect you in the air and ibuprofen for any aches and pains.
2. Add the eye mask to your list of must haves – An eye shade can help you relax on the plane and block out the light allowing you to get a bit of shut eye and relax your senses. Don’t take the nylon ones that the airline gives you as they are paper thin and may not even help. Instead invest in a cushy pair with padding to block out the light.
3. Saline solution is your friend – before, during and after the flight keep using a saline solution. Sinuses tend to dry out on an airplane and saline will keep your sinus hydrated and protect from germs in the air.
4. Get up and move – During the flight make sure you move around or do some simple exercises in your seat to get those legs moving – even lifting your legs up and down and flexing your ankles can help. When you arrive at your destination get that blood flowing by taking a walk when you arrive and take another walk after you eat lunch or dinner as it will help with digestion (stomach issues are a major source of irritation for travelers) Walking can also allow for a better night’s sleep too. A hot bath can help to sooth the body and relax your body for sleep, especially after a long day or travel and especially before you lie down for the night when you arrive to your destination.
5. Don’t immediately go to bed in your new destination especially if it is day time – embrace the natural light as it helps to reprogram your body to your new destination. To reprogram your body and reset your internal clock to the time zone you are in now try the Uplift app. The Uplift app ends jet lag naturally and guides travelers though key pressure points to unlock the internal body clock allowing travelers to reset it providing a more enjoyable trip and minimizing the effects of long distance travel.

These are just a few suggestions to make your time in the air more enjoyable.

We’ve all been there if you travel a lot – at some point you will be on an airplane with young children. This is one of those instances where you can’t wing it! It takes a lot of planning and preparation to make sure your trip runs smoothly. Although some things cannot be avoided such as flight delays, there are things you can do to make the flight a bit smoother for kids.

Here are the top 5 strategies for traveling with kids from Uplift Ventures LLC.

1. Fly early – this is one way to avoid delays and the early flights tend to be less crowded. In addition your kids may be still sleepy so they could most likely nap on the plane.
2. Create distraction kits – Flying with kids is all about keeping them entertained and distracted. Put together a baggie of must haves for each child and make sure siblings have the exact same number of the same items so there is no fighting. Be sure to include some surprise toys they have never experienced before – whether it be electronic toys, games or something on their wish list – it will entertain and engage them (and don’t show them before take-off!) Make sure to have gum, water and small lollypops- not too much sugar – it will help with the pressure from take-off and landing. Swallowing helps with the discomfort and of course hydrating is key in the air.
3. Stage a run through on what they can expect – from the security line, to the boarding and inflight – sit down with you kids and have a mock run through from start to finish including taking off their shoes so they know exactly what to expect so there are no surprises. Even run through the bathroom breaks in between security line and boarding to remind them this is bathroom break time (and that time is not negotiable)
4. Keep it simple – Dress comfortably, add a few layers but not too many (you don’t want them forgetting their favorite t-shirt, sweater or sweatshirt someplace in the airport.) Especially for young kids make simple clothing choices - no extra zippers, buttons as that can delay them in the security line or going to the bathroom and think easy on slip on shoes. Simplicity is key for this stage when traveling.
5. Get kids used to bringing and carrying their own carry-on bag – Small backpacks are great and make sure not matter what bag you have them bring that it has a full zipper on it. Nothing like adding to the worry list about items falling out in the airport or rolling down the aisle. Show them responsibility by having them carry a small bag with some key items and goodies. Ask them to choose a few of their favorite games and items that they enjoy playing with and have them add these to their own bag. Make sure to pack an extra outfit and socks in case anything should spill on them or if they get sick. Pack extra zip lock bags too so you can store any dirty or wet clothes and each child has their own bag of snacks. The carry on back could keep them entertained for a while with their own goodies then you can pull out the distraction kit!

Hopefully these strategies can help you on your airline adventures with your kids.
 

The new Qantas Airways non-stop flight from NYC to Sydney is set to be the world’s longest flight at 20 hours! Read what Time Magazine has to see about this amazing travel industry milestone and what implications this has for Jet Lag solutions like Uplift...

Human Guinea Pigs Prepare for World’s First 20-Hour Commercial Flight

BY ANGUS WHITLEY / BLOOMBERG 

OCTOBER 16, 2019

For decades, travelers have stoically endured jet lag as an unavoidable menace on long journeys. Now, as airlines push for record-breaking non-stop flights halfway around the planet, efforts to counter the debilitating symptoms are turning into a billion-dollar industry.

Fresh insight into the physical and emotional toll of ultra-long haul travel should emerge this weekend when Qantas Airways Ltd. flies direct from New York to Sydney. No airline has ever completed that route without stopping. At nearly 20 hours, it’s set to be the world’s longest flight, leaving the U.S. on Friday and landing in Australia during its Sunday morning.

This will be more than an endurance exercise. Scientists and medical researchers in the cabin will turn Qantas’s brand-new Boeing Co. Dreamliner into a high-altitude laboratory. They’ll screen the brains of the pilots for alertness, while monitoring the food, sleep and activity of the few dozen passengers — including yours truly. The aim is to see how humans hold up to the ordeal.

The proliferation of super-long flights — Singapore Airlines Ltd. resumed non-stop services to New York last year — is partly driven by the development of lighter, more aerodynamic aircraft that can fly further.

The physical burden on customers is putting a renewed focus on jet lag, and creating a supermarket of products and home-made creations to ease the suffering. In that shopping basket: melatonin tablets, Pfizer Inc.’s anti-anxiety medication Xanax, and Propeaq light-emitting glasses that claim to get the body back on track. And yes, there’s an app for that and many other potential remedies.

The potential customer base is staggering. The International Air Transport Association expects some 4.6 billion people to take a flight in 2019, a total that will jump to 8.2 billion in 2037.

No airline has ever completed this 20-hour route.

The Qantas flight will have scientists on board to test the effects on passengers and pilots. More @business: https://t.co/qGMAC4q6ZI pic.twitter.com/5rOKbim8DB

— Bloomberg TicToc (@tictoc) October 15, 2019

Demand for jet-lag therapies is growing at about 6% each year and the industry will be worth $732 million in 2023, according to BIS Healthcare. The broader sleeping-disorder market — dominated by pills — is worth $1.5 billion and will swell to $1.7 billion by 2023, GlobalData says, adding that more than 80 drugs targeting disturbed sleep are in clinical development.

New York-Sydney Fast Facts

Jet lag typically strikes when a traveler crosses three times zones or more in quick order, leaving the body’s internal clock running to the timetable at home. The chief complaint after touching down is often overwhelming fatigue during the day or merciless insomnia at night. The fallout can be worse heading east, because traveling in that direction effectively reverses the normal day-and-night cycle.

Unsettling as they are, those ailments barely do jet lag justice.

Each of the billions of cells in the human body has its own clock, and vital processes including heart function, food absorption and metabolism are all disrupted when organs get out of step, said Carrie Partch, a biochemist and associate professor at the University of California Santa Cruz who has studied the circadian rhythm for 20 years.

“Jet lag is more than just an inconvenience,” Partch said in an interview. “It’s pretty devastating physiologically. If you’re a constant traveler, you’ll probably put on more weight, you’ll probably have cardiovascular challenges and you may have some behavioral changes.”

While researchers in this field understand how light enters the brain and adjusts the master clock, they’re still learning more. As recently as 2017, scientists won a Nobel prize for discovering molecular mechanisms that control circadian rhythms. Even if the core proteins of a rodent can be manipulated in a laboratory to speed up internal clock adjustment, a fast-acting pill that can do the same for frequent flyers is a way off, Partch said.

An App For That

Scientists have found exercise and the right food can help synchronize the body to a new time zone, though research has also repeatedly shown sunlight is the most powerful tool. A University of Boulder Colorado study in 2017 said body-clock adjustment can be rapidly achieved by exposure to natural light alone.

U.S.

Flight Attendants 'Begging' Not to Fly on 737 Max Planes

Friday’s flight from New York, and another from London later this year, are key tests for Qantas as it prepares to start direct commercial services from those cities to Sydney as soon as 2022. The airline calls it Project Sunrise. If successful, Qantas says other super-long, non-stop routes from Australia’s east coast to South America and Africa might follow.

Airbus SE and Boeing are vying to supply the carrier with new long-range aircraft that can reach the destination with a full load and fuel to spare. Qantas plans to make a decision to press ahead with these flights, or ditch the idea, by the end of 2019.

It’s not just crossing time zones that upsets passengers. General fatigue, poor-quality sleep, as well as the dry and pressurized cabin air exacerbate jet-lag symptoms, said Conrad Moreira, a medical director at the Travel Doctor-TMVC clinic in Sydney who has worked in the field for more than a decade.

“I’ve seen people disoriented a week after a flight,” Moreira said in an interview. He prescribes a range of sleep-inducing drugs, particularly for anxious flyers. They including Stilnox — also known as Ambien — and Xanax. Tablets containing melatonin, naturally produced in the body to promote sleep, can also help, he said.

BUSINESS

Australia's Qantas Tests 19 ½ Hour London-Sydney Flight

Jet lag has been confounding travelers since, well, the jet era. There are already at least half a dozen ultra-long flights lasting 17 hours or more, including an Auckland-Doha service by Qatar Airways. Qantas last year started direct services to London from Perth on Australia’s western seaboard.

Just like all those routes, Qantas’s planned network of longer, clock-busting flights will be prey to rising fuel prices. And beyond that, there’s a growing movement to encourage flyers to cut their carbon emissions. Still, the airline’s stock has soared about fivefold in five years. Qantas rose 2.9% Tuesday to its highest since August 2018.

Addressing the health implications of ultra-long flights is critical for Qantas. It must gain permission from Australia’s civil aviation regulator for cabin crew to be on duty longer than 20 hours. The airline also needs a new deal with pilots who will fly the extra-long routes on new aircraft.

Managing staff exhaustion from lengthy trips is an issue for the entire industry. According to IATA’s latest fatigue-management manual, some cabin crew can spend almost 21 hours awake on the day of a long-haul flight — even when their duty period is shorter than 10 hours.

Qantas’s ultra-long direct flights will be priced squarely at the business traveler, since they stand to win precious hours on the ground at the destination, said Rico Merkert, professor of transport and supply-chain management at the University of Sydney’s business school.

“It could be a game changer if they get it right,” Merkert said.

CONTACT US AT EDITORS@TIME.COM.

Contact: Ted Finn

tedfinn@upliftnaturally.com

 (508) 785-2300

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                                                                                                                               

Uplift Mobile App Starts Measuring Users Annual Jet Lag!

DOVER, MA (July 1, 2019) – Uplift Ventures announced today its consumer phone app will start measuring a user’s cumulative, annual Jet Lag by keeping track of the time zones crossed or “Zonage”.  

“For the first time, we will provide global travelers with insight and data they can share on the number of time zones they cross each year,” said Ted Finn, Co-Founder and & CEO of Uplift Ventures, LLC.

“Now that Uplift has developed a protocol to address and neutralize Jet Lag, we need to develop a vocabulary to discuss the problem and the metric to measure it”, Ted continued.  “With the latest update to our mobile app, Uplift will calculate our users cumulative, annual Jet Lag by measuring the number of time zones the user crosses. We refer to this as your Zonage and everyone should know their Zonage.”  NASA research tells us that for each time zone crossed it can take a traveler as long as 12 hours to one full day for their body to fully adjust. In his past career scaling a global shoe company, Ted would cross at least 150 time zones every year and saw the value in this new feature. The entire Uplift team is proud of this new feature as it empowers travelers everywhere with meaningful insight to track and share other layers of your travel experience.  In a recent correspondence to shareholders, CFO Bill Davlin says, “My only wish was that the Uplift Mobile App existed during the last 20 years ago, I could have spared myself countless weeks of bravely working through painful days and sleepless nights. Everyone should know their Zonage”.

Are you traveling without Jet Lag yet? What is your Zonage?

About Uplift Ventures LLC:

Uplift Ventures, LLC’s mission is to improve the health and wellness of airline travelers and night shift workers around the globe. Uplift Ventures LLC was Co-Founded by Dr. Charles T. Krebs, a world leader in Energetic Kinesiology and the creator of Biorhythmic Acupressure. Dr. Krebs is a global author and co-author of 3 books in English and 1 in German and over 50 published papers on kinesiology, acupressure and neuroscience.  Dr. Krebs is the creator of the Learning Enhancement Acupressure Program (LEAP) that is used by thousands of practitioners in 9 countries to treat dyslexia, ADD, ADHD and more. Dr. Krebs is a practitioner at the Lydian Center in Cambridge, MA where he does research and holds a PhD in Biology & Physiology from Boston University. For more information on Uplift, please visit www.upliftnaturally.com. If you wish to learn more about exciting news about how Uplift is impacting the global travel community please contact Ted Finn: tedfinn@upliftnaturally.com.