The sad thing about people like GP is they'll spread stuff like that for 40 years, and then become silent once they get cancer, COPD, or whatever that quite possibly was at least influenced by their lifestyle decisions.
Sorta like those construction workers that are full of bravado at 25, and can barely get out of a chair at 50 because they wrecked their body with improper lifting technique.
I think if you work for 25 years in construction you are bound to wreck your body regardless of what you do. It's hard to not wreck your body in that span of time even if you only do yoga and meditate for that long.
I know many people with 30+ years in construction that are physically fine (I'm ~ 60 ATM).
A good technique and steady approach goes a long way and there are many jobs in construction that don't break the body - crane operator, bobcat | front end loader | etc. operator.
Push up slab building have been around for decades now, if you can avoid being squashed under a giant mass of concrete (not that common) you're not going to be putting your back out (unless you're running at jobs like a bull at a gate).
Sure, but in any hard graft manual labour industry that's why you have young guns.
Anybody that stays in such an industry for 20+ years has (generally) worked smarter and not destroyed their body - they're still in the industry but moved onto machine operations, management, supervision, health and safety, etc.
Sorta like those construction workers that are full of bravado at 25, and can barely get out of a chair at 50 because they wrecked their body with improper lifting technique.