HEALTH BRIEFING:Just two-and-a-half hours of moderate exercise a week can reduce the risk of heart disease, researchers say.
While more exercise is better, 150 minutes a week can lower the risk of heart disease by 14 per cent compared to people who are inactive.
Experts in the US examined data from 33 studies of physical activity and heart disease, including nine which looked at how much exercise people were actually doing.
The study, published in Circulation, the journal of the American Heart Association, found a 14 per cent reduced risk for those doing moderate exercise for 150 minutes a week, and a 20 per cent reduced risk for those exercising for 300 minutes a week.
Moderate activity includes very brisk walking, heavy cleaning such as washing windows, vacuuming and mopping; mowing the lawn, cycling and badminton.
Jacob Sattelmair, from the Department of Epidemiology at the Harvard School of Public Health, said: “Early studies broke people into groups such as active and sedentary.
“More recent studies have begun to assess the actual amount of physical activity people are getting and how that relates to their risk of heart disease.”