A paper published in Nature Magazine showed that tiny spurts of exercise throughout the day are associated with significant reductions in disease risk. The researchers used data from fitness trackers collected by the UK company Biobank. They looked at the records of 25K people who did not regularly exercise, with an average age of 60 years old. They followed them over the course of almost seven years. Those who engaged in one or two-minute burst of exercise three times a day like speed-walking or rapidly climbing stairs showed a nearly 50% reduction in cardiovascular mortality risk and about a 40% reduction in the risk of dying from cancer as well as all causes of mortality. This shows that it’s not necessary to do vigorous workouts—every little bit of exercise helps.
