A group of scientists of Harvard revealed the results of a long-lasting investigation.
The study compared the levels of mortality of the people who make physical activity with those who do little or nothing.
The differences were notable and highlight how fundamental it is for the health move.
The importance of strength exercises
Recently, 5 scientists from the TH Chan School of Public Health of the Harvard University released the results of an investigation that sought to shed light on the relationship of strength and aerobic activity with human mortality.
The experts, who published the article in the magazine British Journal of Sports Medicine, they studied 147,374 people (31,540 men and 115,834 women) over a period of up to 30 years. During that time, 35,798 of the participants died.
First, they compared those who did strength training (weights, machines, etc.) with those who did not. This is how they detected that Those who performed between 90 and 119 minutes of strength training per week had a 13% lower risk of dying from any cause, 19% lower risk of dying from cardiovascular diseases and 27% lower risk of dying from neurological diseases.
Contrary to popular belief, scientists found no clear additional benefits above 120 minutes of strength training per week.
Another peculiarity of the study is that the lower mortality from cancer was observed only in those who did strength exercises between 1 and 59 minutes per week.
Walking a certain number of hours reduces the risk of death
After relating the level of mortality to strength exercises, the scientists added the variable aerobic activity. That is, they compared the results of those people who did not do strength exercises and who had little or no aerobic activity with those who had a high practice of both.
Thus, they determined that People who perform between 30 and 45 MET-hours per week of aerobic training and between 60 and 119 minutes per week of strength exercises have a 45% lower risk of mortality than those that do not do it or do it very little.
Experts use METs (Metabolic Equivalent of Task) hours as a unit that allows different types of physical activity—such as walking, running, or cycling—to be added into a single measure that reflects both time and effort.
According to the latest edition of Compendium of physical activitiesone of the most used references in this type of research, walking at a moderate pace carrying a backpack for one hour is equivalent to at least 4 METs.
If you take the above into account, there is no need to run dozens of kilometers or spend the entire day in the gym: with Walking briskly for at least 7 hours a week and doing at least one hour of strength exercises can significantly reduce the level of mortality.
