Five extra minutes of walking per day could avert up to 10% of early deaths, exercise-tracking data from more than 135,000 people over 40 suggest.
Summary
Up to 10% of premature deaths could be prevented if everybody walked five more minutes per day – and ten extra minutes could avert up to 15% of deaths. These estimates come from an analysis of exercise data from more than 135,000 people including UK Biobank participants. The results suggest that even very small increases in physical activity could make a difference, particularly for less-active people.
Up to 10% of premature deaths could be prevented if everybody walked five more minutes per day, estimate researchers who analysed activity-tracker data from more than 135,000 older people including UK Biobank participants. “The results from this new study show that every move counts,” commented exercise expert Aiden Doherty from the University of Oxford, UK, who is independent of the study team.
Tiny tweaks matter
The results from this new study show that every move counts.
Professor Aiden Doherty, University of Oxford, UK
Previous studies looked at what would happen if everybody met the 150 active minutes per week recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO). Some people might already be very close to this goal, while for others trying to meet it would mean major changes.
Researchers have now calculated the impact of much smaller, more achievable increases in activity. They analysed movement data from more than 135,000 older people who wore activity trackers: 40,000 from Scandinavia and the US who wore the device on the hip and nearly 95,000 UK Biobank participants who wore the tracker on their wrist.
Movement data was used from nearly 95,000 UK Biobank participants who wore a tracker on their wrist.
Up to 10% of early deaths might be averted if everyone (apart from the most active people) added five minutes of moderately intense exercise to their daily routine. An extra ten minutes of activity a day could avert up to 15% of deaths, the researchers’ calculations show.
Moderately intense activities include brisk walking, cycling, swimming or gardening – anything that increases your heart rate without making you breathe so hard that it’s difficult to talk.
Biggest benefits for least-active people
The potential impact of additional exercise was particularly dramatic for the least-active group of people who averaged two minutes of activity per day. Here, up to 6% of deaths could be prevented with an extra five minutes and up to 9% with an extra ten minutes.
“This finding offers hope, especially to the least active, serving as an inspiring public health message: even small daily tweaks to activity levels can make a meaningful difference,” said exercise researcher Brendon Stubbs from King’s College London, UK, who wasn’t involved in the study.
This finding offers hope, especially to the least active, serving as an inspiring public health message: even small daily tweaks to activity levels can make a meaningful difference.
Brendon Stubbs, King’s College London, UK
It’s important not to take the results as personalised advise, says study leader Ulf Ekelund from the Norwegian School of Sports Sciences. “Small changes are beneficial if all individuals make them, but they might not be beneficial for each individual per se,” he explains.
Ekelund points out that this is an observational study, meaning it can’t prove that more exercise is directly responsible for preventing premature deaths. Nevertheless, “this is an excellent analysis carried out by internationally renowned scientists, using the best available data sources”, Doherty told the Science Media Centre.
To policymakers, says Ekelund, “these results – as those of many other studies – mean that they should put even more emphasis on promoting physical activity and creating activity-friendly environments”.
This research was covered in The Guardian, The Independent, The Times, The Telegraph, Daily Mirror, NBC and New Scientist.
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