Join the club for FREE to access the whole archive and other member benefits.

Greater step count significantly linked with lower all-cause mortality

Doubling from 4,000 to 8,0000 steps halves the risk of death within 10 years

24-Mar-2020

Key points from article :

Study says higher step counts are associated with a lower risk of early death.

Step monitoring done for 4,800 US adults aged 40 and up, from 2003-2006.

Participants were given activity tracker to wear during waking hours for 7 days.

Less physically active people doing 2,000-4,000 steps/day encouraged to do double.

"For those who can fit 6,000-8,000 steps/day, good old ‘10,000 steps/day is a great target."

Increasing pace may bring additional benefits.

Limitations include participants' data being self-reported, only collected at one point in time.

Published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

Mentioned in this article:

Click on resource name for more details.

Charles Matthews

Senior Investigator Division of Cancer Epidemiology & Genetics, National Cancer Institute

Charlie Foster

Chair of UK CMO Expert Committee for Physical Activity, Department of Health

Emmanuel Stamatakis

Professor of Physical Activity, Lifestyle, and Population Health at University of Sydney.

JAMA

General medical journal.

National Cancer Institute (NCI)

Institute for cancer research.

NHS

UK National Health Service, publicly funded healthcare system in England

The University of Sydney

Australia's leading higher education and research University.

University of Bristol

Leading UK university researching infection, human rights, climate change, and information security.

Topics mentioned on this page:
Exercise