The Archives of Internal Medicine published a study based in Australia looking at people who spent more than 11 hours a day sitting (watching TV, sitting at a desk, etc). They found that people who spent all those hours sitting were more likely to die of any cause during a 3-year period, compared to people with more active lives.
Researchers studied 220,000 people in Australia over a three-year period. After three years, they discovered a little over 5,000 of those had died.
Researchers found that those who were sitting for at least 11 hours a day, were 40% more likely to die during the study than the people who sat less than 4 hours a day. Researchers also found sitting showed affects on cholesterol as well.
One important thing to point out is it didn’t really matter whether these people were normal weight or overweight, if they spent time working out, healthy or had other sicknesses. This sedentary lifestyle, with long periods of sitting, was truly damaging.
The take-home message here is to take time NOW and reflect how long you sit during the day and find ways to be more active.