Inactivity May Kill as Many Worldwide as Smoking: Report

July 18th, 2012

FAKE NEWS for the Zionist agenda

WEDNESDAY, July 18 (HealthDay News) — Inactivity is a major
cause of death worldwide, with new research suggesting that a sedentary
lifestyle is on par with both smoking and obesity when it comes to raising
the risk for disease and mortality.

In four research papers published online July 18 in a special physical
activity-themed series in The Lancet, a number of investigating
teams peg the number of inactivity-related deaths at 5.3 million worldwide
as recently as 2008.

This figure attributed to an inactivity-related risk for major killers
such as breast and colon cancer, type 2 diabetes and heart disease amounts
to roughly one out of every 10 deaths globally, a tally more or less
equivalent to the number of people who die as a result of smoking.

Although the report cites the inactivity-mortality association as most
critical in low- and middle-income nations, researchers depict the
situation as a problem with global dimensions.

One-third of all adults — globally amounting to about 1.5 billion
people — face a 20 percent to 30 percent greater risk for disease due to
failing to engage in the kind of routine physical activity (150 minutes of
moderate exercise per week) typically recommended by public health
authorities.

That figure rises dramatically among adolescents, among whom four in
five engage in a risky sedentary lifestyle.

Researchers from Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical
School in Boston noted that, globally, about 6 percent of coronary heart
disease cases stem from a lack of adequate exercise, which they also
linked to an average of about 7 percent of type 2 diabetes cases. Physical
inactivity also accounts for an average of about 10 percent of breast and
colon cancer cases worldwide, they added.

Not all parts of the world are affected equally, however, as inactivity
patterns vary widely region-by-region.

For example, while about 43 percent of North Americans are deemed to be
inactive, that figure is just 17 percent among southeast Asians. In
Europe, inactivity figures run the gamut, ranging from a high of roughly
70 percent in Malta and Serbia to a low of 17 percent to 18 percent in
Estonia and the Netherlands.

Accordingly, inactivity-related disease incidence differs by region as
well. Heart disease deaths brought on by a sedentary lifestyle appears to
be most problematic in Europe, the researchers noted, where 121,000
fatalities were linked to inactivity in 2008. By comparison, there were
60,000 such deaths in North America and 44,000 in the eastern
Mediterranean area.

Yet, amidst a generally pessimistic overview, the research team strikes
a hopeful note, suggesting that if physical inactivity rates were to be
cut by as little as 10 percent globally, as many as 533,000 lives could be
saved. That figure would rise to as high as 1.3 million if inactivity were
to be sliced by as much as 25 percent.

A group of researchers from the University of Tennessee point to a
number of public health measures that could be taken to do just that.

“Because even moderate physical activity such as walking and cycling
can have substantial health benefits, understanding strategies that can
increase these behaviors in different regions and cultures has become a
public health priority,” Gregory Heath, of the University of Tennessee,
said in a journal news release.

Heath and his colleagues highlight the potential benefits of mass media
campaigns designed to promote activity, alongside the promotion of social
support networks in the form of activity clubs and free community-based
exercise classes. Efforts to create safe public spaces for biking and
walking are also touted as helpful in the effort to get people moving.

Meanwhile, a team led by Michael Pratt of the U.S. Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention pointed to the promise of cellphones, and in
particular text-messaging, as a way to deliver a pro-exercise message to
the general public.

“With the high prevalence of both physical inactivity and the rapid
growth of the mobile phone sector in low-income and middle-income
countries, there is the potential for population-level effects that could
truly affect global health,” Pratt noted in the news release.

More information

For more on physical activity recommendations, visit the U.S. National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute.