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Studies Show Exercise Can Significantly Extend Life Expectancy

Participating in leisure time exercise can extend a person’s life expectancy by up to 4.5 years, suggest researchers.

Based on pooled data from six cohort studies, Steven Moore (National Cancer Institute, Bethesda, Maryland, USA) and colleagues predict that even people who only participate in half the government recommended amount of exercise per week, equivalent to 32.5-75.0 minutes of moderate-to-vigorous intensity activity, will extend their lives by 1.8 years.

Writing in PLoS Medicine, the team reports that although obesity was linked to a lower life expectancy in their analysis, physical exercise appeared to diminish the negative effects of overweight to a certain degree.

“Our findings highlight the important contribution that leisure-time physical activity in adulthood can make to longevity,” said Moore in a press statement.

“Regular exercise extended the lives in every group that we examined in our study – normal weight, overweight, or obese.”

Moore and team pooled data on 654,827 healthy adults aged 21 to 90 years to assess the impact of exercise on life expectancy.

The median follow-up period was 10 years…

Read more: News Medical

 

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