Oct. 25, 2023 – Take a brisk 22-minute walk to combat the health risks of sitting at a desk all day or indulging in a Netflix binge all day.
New research shows that individuals who get at the very least 22 minutes of physical activity daily reduce their risk of early death. The results were published Tuesday in British Journal of Sports Medicine.
Most people in Western countries spend between 9 and 10 hours sitting when not sleeping, with nearly all of this occurring during an individual's workday, the researchers found. Sedentary time is linked to early death, and it’s well-known that physical activity has widespread health advantages. The aim of this latest study was to look at how much sedentary time is required to trigger the danger of early death and the way much physical activity is required to scale back this risk. Researchers checked out physical activity levels comparable to at the very least a brisk walk or gardening.
For the evaluation, researchers in Norway combined data from 4 previous studies of 12,000 people aged 50 or older who wore hip-mounted fitness trackers to measure their lively and sedentary time. The data was excluded from midnight to six a.m., when people typically sleep.
The evaluation showed that sitting for greater than 12 hours a day was related to a 38% higher risk of early death only in individuals who did lower than 22 minutes of moderate to vigorous physical activity per day.
There was no threshold for the period of time spent sitting triggering health risks, but any increase in moderate physical activity led to a lower risk of early death. The study also showed that increasing physical activity was more protective than reducing sedentary time.
The results are much like the CDC's physical activity Recommendation for adults, which recommends 150 minutes per week of moderate aerobic activity akin to walking. Spread over 7 days, 150 minutes in every week equals just over 21 minutes a day. The CDC also says adults should perform muscle-strengthening activities for the foremost muscle groups of legs, hips, back, abdomen, chest, shoulders and arms at the very least twice every week.