Did you know walking can lower risk of early death? Find out today!.

Put on your walking shoes and don’t forget your step counter: You can reduce your risk for cancer, heart disease and early death by getting up to 10,000 steps a day, but any amount of walking helps, according to a new study.

Health benefits rose with every step, the study found but peaked at 10,000 steps – after that the effects faded. Counting steps may be especially important for people who do unstructured, unplanned physical activity such as housework, gardening and dog walks.
“Notably, we detected an association between incidental steps (steps taken to go about daily life) and a lower risk of both cancer and heart disease,” noted study coauthor Borja del Pozo Cruz, an adjunct associate professor at the University of Southern Denmark in Odense, Denmark, and senior researcher in health sciences for the University of Cadiz in Spain.

“Physical activity is just absolutely magnificent,” Freeman said. “And when if you blend that with eating a more plant-based diet, de-stressing, sleeping enough and connecting with others – that’s your magic recipe. It’s the fountain of youth if you will.”

However, if walking occurred at a brisk pace of 112 steps a minute for 30 minutes, it maximized risk reduction, leading to a 62% reduction in dementia risk. The 30 minutes of fast-paced walking didn’t have to occur all at once, either – it could be spread out over the day.

Years later, researchers compared that data to medical records and found people who took the most steps per minute – in this case, approximately 80 steps per minute – showed the biggest reduction in risk for cancer, heart disease and early death from any cause.

“We observed a 62% reduction for dementia: This figure was almost 80% for CVD mortality and incidence and much less (approx. 20%) for cancer.This may be related to specific pathways by which physical activity is beneficial.It pushes the body in general: can generate more muscle, a bigger heart and a better fitness, all of which are known protective factors for cardiovascular disease and cancer, and other health issues too,” del Pozo Cruz said.
What’s the takeaway? You don’t have to fixate on the number of steps (unless you really want to), Freeman said.
“Does every step count? Absolutely. And we know that brisk walking each day brings on extra benefits in terms of blood pressure reduction and cardiovascular training and so forth,” said Freeman, who was the founding chair of the American College of Cardiology’s Nutrition & Lifestyle workgroup.

What is breathlessness as it applies to exercise? It’s not gasping and panting so hard you can barely breathe. Instead, breathlessness is when you are walking with someone, they talk to you, and you have a bit of trouble talking back, Freeman said.
“Spend 30 minutes being breathless at whatever pace you’re at, and then keep challenging yourself to be slightly unsatisfied at your current level so you can get better and better,” Freeman said.

Being more physically active often jumpstarts other healthy habits, such as an improved diet, and discourages unhealthy ones, such as smoking, he added.

Article By Suzy Nyongesa.