Exercising throughout adulthood slashes the risk of early death by 30% to 40%, but any activity is better than none, a study has found.<\/p>\n
While long-term good habits reap the most benefits, switching to a more active lifestyle at any point in adulthood extends life, suggesting it is never too late to get healthy, researchers said.<\/p>\n
Overall, physically active people are less likely to die from a range of conditions, including heart disease, stroke and cancer.<\/p>\n
Experts reviewed 85 existing studies on millions of people for their research, published online in the British Journal of Sports Medicine.<\/p>\n
They found that people who were consistently physically active had around a 30%-40% lower risk of dying from any cause, while those who increased their levels of exercise (from below recommended amounts) had a 20-25% lower risk.<\/p>\n
Notably, people who switched from being physically inactive to being active were 22% less likely to die from any cause than those who remained inactive.<\/p>\n
The team, including experts from the University of Queensland in Australia, wrote: \u201cSeveral mechanisms may explain the reduced mortality risk with high physical activity, such as physical function improvement and anti-inflammatory effects.\u201d<\/p>\n
They said their results \u201cemphasised the importance of physical activity across adulthood, indicating that initiating physical activity at any point in adulthood may provide survival benefits\u201d.<\/p>\n
Currently, the World Health Organization (WHO) recommends adults aim for 150-300 minutes per week of moderate-intensity physical activity, or 75-150 minutes per week of vigorous-intensity activity, or a combination of the two.<\/p>\n
Examples of moderate activity include very brisk walking (4mph\/6.4kph or faster), heavy cleaning such as washing windows or mopping, cycling at 10mph-12mph (16.1kph-19.3kph), or badminton.<\/p>\n
Vigorous activity includes hiking, jogging at 6mph (9.7kph) or faster, shovelling, fast cycling, a football game, basketball or tennis.<\/p>\n
Cancer Research UK health information manager Amy Hirst said: \u201cBeing active has many benefits, and by helping you keep a healthy weight, it can reduce the risk of 13 different types of cancer.<\/p>\n
\u201cAny exercise is better than none, and the more you do, the better.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou don\u2019t need to run a marathon or join a gym \u2013 anything that gets you warmer, slightly out of breath and your heart beating faster counts.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo, whether you go for a brisk walk, a cycle with a friend, or even get the housework done, these all count as ways to be active.<\/p>\n
\u201cThink about making small changes to your daily routine \u2013 it all adds up and helps you get moving more.\u201d<\/p>\n
British Heart Foundation senior cardiac nurse June Davison said: \u201cThis review suggests that being consistently active is associated with a reduction in deaths from any cause.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt suggests it is never too late to get active, as switching to a more active lifestyle at any point in adulthood has health benefits, such as reducing the risk of death from cardiovascular disease.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo keep your heart healthy, adults should aim to be active every day, building up to a total of 150 minutes of\u00a0moderate-intensity activity every week.<\/p>\n
\u201cSimple everyday activities, like a brisk 10-minute walk during your lunch break, all count.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sport England chief executive Tim Hollingsworth said: \u201cDoing something will always be better than doing nothing, and as is rightly stated \u2013 it is also never too late to start.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe report reaffirms that being physically active should be championed at every turn by decision-makers for the good of our health, communities, economy and country.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ukactive chief executive Huw Edwards said: \u201cThis study provides clear evidence that switching to an active lifestyle, at any life stage, has a drastic impact on prolonging life.\u201d \u2013 PA Media\/dpa<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Exercising throughout adulthood slashes the risk of early death by 30% to 40%, but any activity is better…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":94876,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[1728,1198,210,67,132,68,6666],"class_list":{"0":"post-94875","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-fitness","8":"tag-exercise","9":"tag-fitness","10":"tag-health","11":"tag-united-states","12":"tag-unitedstates","13":"tag-us","14":"tag-workout"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114921261467251317","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94875","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=94875"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94875\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/94876"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=94875"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=94875"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=94875"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}