Daily walking reduces the risk of cardiovascular diseases and premature death

If you take 9-10 thousand steps every day, you can reduce the risk of cardiovascular diseases (by 21%) and the probability of premature death (by 39%). Walking helps normalize blood pressure.

This is according to a new study, published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine, writes CNN.

Scientists investigated the impact of a sedentary lifestyle using data from 72,000 people who had previously participated in the UK Biobank project. Within its limits, the health status of more than half a million Britons, who were from 40 to 69 years old at the time of the start of the experiment, was monitored. It lasted at least a decade.

For a new study participants wore activity trackers on their wrists for seven days. These devices tracked daily steps and time spent sitting or lying down (excluding sleep).

People who sat for more than ten hours a day were classified as high-risk, and those who sat for less than 10.5 hours were considered low-risk.

For seven years, the researchers followed the health of the participants, and also checked the records of their hospitalizations and deaths.

They found that for people at low and high risk levels, any daily number of steps (more than two thousand) reduced the likelihood of developing cardiovascular disease or premature death.

At the same time, people who covered 9-10 thousand steps per day received the greatest benefit.

Cardiologist Andrew Freeman says that “walking every day can do wonders.”

“Physical exercises have a number of advantages. They really test and strain the cardiovascular system. And the heart is a muscle, and in order to become healthy, it needs to be trained.

Walking helps to burn calories, maintain a normal weight and normalize blood pressure. The benefits of walking for the cardiovascular system are connected with this”– explains Freeman.

Researchers note that daily walking is not a “panacea” for people who lead a sedentary lifestyle, and will not be able to completely eliminate its negative consequences.

“However, our study is an important message to the public that all movement matters. People can and should try to offset the health consequences of a sedentary lifestyle by increasing the number of daily steps they take.” – said Matthew Ahmadi, the lead author of the study and a researcher at the Charles Perkins Center at the University of Sydney in Australia.

We used to toldthat women and men benefit differently from the same amount of exercise.