31% of the world’s population does not do any kind of exercise; especially women

MADRID (EUROPA PRESS) – 31% of the world’s adult population, that is, almost 1.8 billion adults, do not do any type of physical activity and run the risk of getting sick because of it, especially women, which represents a increase of 6% between 2010 and 2022, reveal new data presented by the World Health Organization (WHO) and published in an article in ‘The Lancet Global Health’.

The results point to a “worrying” trend of physical inactivity among adults, going from 24% in 2010 to 31% in 2022. WHO experts highlighted at the press conference presenting the study, if the trend continues, it will be Inactivity levels are projected to continue rising to reach 35% by 2030, and the world is currently far from meeting the global goal of reducing physical inactivity by 2030.

However, Spain is below the world average since only 25% of the population does not do any type of physical activity, with women being more inactive than men.

Currently, the World Health Organization (WHO) recommends that adults engage in 150 minutes of moderate-intensity physical activity, or 75 minutes of vigorous-intensity physical activity, or equivalent, per week, so failure to comply with these recommendations It would be within the concept of “physical inactivity”, where a third of the world’s population is found.

In this context, the director of health promotion at the WHO, Dr. Ruediger Krech, warned that inactivity is “a silent threat to global health” since it “contributes significantly to the burden of chronic diseases such as cardiovascular, cancer, diabetes or respiratory diseases.

“In 10 years, 500 million new cases of non-communicable diseases could be avoided, at a cost to the public health system of 300 billion dollars, if populations reached recommended levels of physical activity. Physical activity must be accessible, affordable and enjoyable for everyone so that we can significantly reduce the risk of non-communicable diseases and mental disorders,” he noted.

On the other hand, the data also reveal a continuation of the trend of women being less active than men, with inactivity rates of 34 versus 29 percent, “increasing in some countries to 20% and in more than one one-third of countries is more than 10 percent,” said WHO Head of Surveillance, Monitoring and Reporting, Department of Noncommunicable Diseases, Dr. Leanne Riley.

Likewise, the highest rates of physical inactivity are seen in the high-income Asia-Pacific region (48%) and South Asia (45%), while inactivity levels in other regions range from 28% of countries high-income Western countries, including Spain, and 14 percent in Oceania.

Furthermore, people over 60 years of age are less active than other adults, which underscores the importance of promoting physical activity among older adults.

Experts said there are multiple reasons why physical inactivity is increasing worldwide, including changes in work patterns (tendency towards more sedentary work), changes in the environment, which make active transport more difficult, and changes in leisure activities, i.e. more sedentary activities in front of a screen.

Given these data, the World Health Organization called on countries to strengthen the application of policies that promote and facilitate physical activity.