Don’t give up on exercise – UK Biobank data shows just a bit of extra activity can extend our lives as scientists identify the key ways we can live longer
Brisk walking for an extra five minutes a day can reduce your risk of early death by 10%, research shows.
The Lancet study tracked 95,000 middle-aged and older adults in the UK as well as 40,000 people from Norway, Sweden and the US. Data from the UK Biobank arm of the study also showed cutting our sedentary time by 30 minutes a day could reduce 4.5% of deaths among all adults taking part in the study, apart from those who were already very active.
The research, led by the Norwegian School of Sports Sciences, also showed an extra 10 minutes of moderate intensity exercise was linked to a 15% reduction in deaths.
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It comes amid fears that older people who are generally inactive can give up on exercise and not realise a little can go a long way.
Dr Daniel Bailey, sedentary behaviour expert at Brunel University of London, who was not involved in the research, said: “The really promising finding from this study is that just an extra 5 minutes per day can help. This should be feasible for most people, even those who only do very small amounts of physical activity already.
“Moderate activities are those what make us breathe a bit heavier and feel warmer. So simple daily activities like a brisk walk, housework or gardening will do the trick. And if we want to reduce sitting by 30 minutes a day, this can be swapped for light activities like pottering around the house or a slow walk.
“A clear message we want to get across is that every movement counts and getting inactive people to do some activity is where we see the biggest gains in health. Every minute counts.”
Co-author Professor Melody Ding, of the University of Sydney in Australia, said: “Considering that it is unlikely for all individuals to achieve the World Health Organisation’s physical activity recommendations of 150 min of moderate-to-vigorous-intensity physical activity weekly, our data underscore the large impact of realistic and achievable behaviour goals on population health.”
A separate study, published in eClinicalMedicine, also drawing on data from the UK Biobank research database, outlined the key ways we can live longer.
People who had the best sleep, exercised most and had the most healthy diets lived for 9.35 years longer than those with the worst sleep, lowest activity levels and poorest diets. And they spent more of their lives in good health.
The team calculated that a “combined dose” of increasing sleep by five minutes per day, just two minutes more of increased moderate to vigorous physical activity and half an extra portion of vegetables could increase a person’s lifespan by one year for people with the worst sleep, lowest activity levels and poorest diets.
“This study demonstrates that small, concurrent improvements in sleep, physical activity, and diet quality were associated with clinically meaningful theoretical gains in lifespan and healthspan,” the research paper concluded.
