By Joke Kujenya
TAKING CORE daily steps was associated with lower risks of cardiovascular disease and early death, including among people with highly sedentary lifestyles, according to research published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine (BJSM).
JKNewsMedia.com reports that the researchers reported in 2024 that the more steps people took each day, regardless of how much time they spent sitting, the lower their risk of cardiovascular disease and mortality.
Sedentary lifestyles are increasingly common and are linked to higher odds of dying from cardiovascular disease, greater risk of cancer and diabetes, and a shorter lifespan.
Previous evidence has also shown that people with higher step counts and faster walking pace face lower risks.
Population health scientist Matthew Ahmadi of the University of Sydney said the findings should not be viewed as a substitute for reducing sedentary behaviour.
“This is by no means a get out of jail card for people who are sedentary for excessive periods of time,” Ahmadi said.
“However, it does hold an important public health message that all movement matters and that people can and should try to offset the health consequences of unavoidable sedentary time by upping their daily step count.”
Ahmadi and colleagues analysed data from 72,174 volunteers in the UK Biobank, a long-term dataset established in 2006 that will continue tracking participants’ health measures for at least 30 years.
The study included an average of 6.9 years of general health data for each participant.
Volunteers wore wrist accelerometers for seven days to estimate physical activity levels, including daily step counts and time spent sitting.
The researchers also recorded a median sedentary time of 10.6 hours a day.
Participants spending more time than that were classified as having high sedentary time, while those below the median were classified as having low sedentary time.
People whose health status during the first two years may have influenced the results were excluded from the study.
Also, the researchers noted that the findings apply only to participants who were generally healthy during that period and said it was unclear whether the data included participants with disabilities affecting step count.
The team found that between 9,000 and 10,000 daily steps were optimal for countering a highly sedentary lifestyle, reducing incident cardiovascular disease risk by 21 percent and mortality risk by 39 per cent.
JKNewsMedia.com also reports that the researchers reported they found that around 50 percent of the benefits were achieved at approximately 4,000 to 4,500 daily steps, regardless of sedentary time.
“Any number of daily steps above the referent 2,200 steps per day was associated with lower mortality and incident CVD risk, for low and high sedentary time,” Ahmadi and colleagues wrote.
“Accruing between 9,000 and 10,000 steps a day optimally lowered the risk of mortality and incident CVD among highly sedentary participants.”
The research was published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine. An earlier version of the article was published in March 2024.
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