People who currently do very low levels of exercise could potentially add six years to their lives if they walked for an hour every day.
A study by Griffith University, using US-based accelerometry data, found the most active quarter of people had a 73 percent lower risk of death than their least active counterparts.
“For that least active quartile, a single one-hour walk could potentially return a benefit of around six additional hours of life,” the study report said.
Lead researcher Professor Lennert Veerman said people who were largely inactive had the most to gain from extra walking.
“If you’re already very active or in that top quartile, an extra hour’s walk may not make much difference as you’ve, in a sense, already ‘maxxed out’ your benefit,” he said.
“If the least active quartile of the population over age 40 were to increase their activity level to that of the most active quartile however, they might live, on average, about 11 years longer.
“This is not an unreasonable prospect, as 25 percent of the population is already doing it. It can be any type of exercise but would roughly be the equivalent of just under three hours of walking per day.”
The study report said that, while physical activity had long been known to be good for health, there were varying estimates on the benefits gained from different amounts of activity.
The Griffith University study found the benefits were around twice as strong as previous estimates.
The research team suggested low levels of physical activity could rival the negative effects of smoking, with other research finding each cigarette could take 11 minutes from a smoker’s life.
“By extension, a more active lifestyle could also offer protective effects against heart disease, stroke, certain cancers and other chronic illnesses, with the study’s findings highlighting a need for national physical activity guidelines to be revisited using these methods,” the study report said.
The paper Physical activity and life expectancy: a life-table analysis has been published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine.
