Getting in 40 minutes of walking a day would reap big rewards in overall health. from http://www.shutterstock.com

True in Australia; true here, too!

“In my practice as a GP, I have been impressed by a few energetic and active 80 year olds who remain in good health while many their age have succumbed to various chronic diseases. So in 2005, when the University of Newcastle established a large community based health study of people aged 55 to 80, I made sure we recorded the participants’ physical activity in detail.

“A decade later, we can report the influence of physical activity on the need for hospital care as published in the Medical Journal of Australia today.

“We used pedometers to record daily step counts, giving a much more precise measure of activity than the usual self-report questionnaires. Median daily step counts ranged from 8,600 in the youngest to 3,800 in those over 80 years, and weekend days had on average 620 fewer steps than weekdays.”

Read this article in its entirety at The Converstion.