11/3/2022 0 Comments Number of steps in a kilometreRealistically, few of us reach that 10,000-step goal, anyway. But the extra steps did not provide much additional protection against dying young, either. The statistical benefits of additional steps were slight, meaning it did not hurt people to amass more daily steps, up to and beyond the 10,000-steps mark. In that study, people who walked for about 8,000 steps a day were half as likely to die prematurely from heart disease or any other cause as those who accumulated 4,000 steps a day. In other words, older women who completed fewer than half of the mythic 10,000 daily steps tended to live substantially longer than those who covered even less ground.Īnother, more expansive study last year of almost 5,000 middle-aged men and women of various ethnicities likewise found that 10,000 steps a day are not a requirement for longevity. The risks for early death continued to drop among the women walking more than 5,000 steps a day, but benefits plateaued at about 7,500 daily steps. Lee and her colleagues found that women in their 70s who managed as few as 4,400 steps a day reduced their risk of premature death by about 40 percent, compared to women completing 2,700 or fewer steps a day. It also translated as “10,000-steps meter,” creating a walking aim that, through the decades, somehow became embedded in our global consciousness - and fitness trackers.īut today’s best science suggests we do not need to take 10,000 steps a day, which is about five miles, for the sake of our health or longevity.Ī 2019 study by Dr. A clock maker, hoping to capitalize on interest in fitness after the 1964 Tokyo Olympic Games, mass-produced a pedometer with a name that, when written in Japanese characters, resembled a walking man. Chan School of Public Health and an expert on step counts and health, the 10,000-steps target became popular in Japan in the 1960s. I-Min Lee, a professor of epidemiology at the Harvard T.H. But the goal of taking 10,000 steps, which many of us believe is rooted in science, in fact rests on coincidence and sticky history rather than research.Īccording to Dr. Fitness tracking devices often recommend we take 10,000 steps a day.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |