Who doesn’t know the importance of a good night’s sleep but we’re also aware that getting to the land of dreams isn’t always that easy. But what if we told you that there is an easy way to reverse the damaging effects of sleeplessness?
That’s right! Scientists have found in a study that brisk walking for two and a half hours a week or running one hour 15 minutes weekly could banish most of the damage caused by poor sleep.
Looking at UK biobank data from over 380,000 adults with an average age of 56 years, the study published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine found that people who didn't exercise enough and slept poorly were 57 per cent more likely to die prematurely. They also had a 67 per cent higher risk of developing cardiovascular disease and their risk of being diagnosed with cancer increased by 45 per cent.
However, the team found that meeting the lower threshold of the current physical activity guidelines (that is 600 metabolic equivalent minutes per week) helped eliminate most of the deleterious associations of poor sleep with mortality.
It is important to note that the observational study does not establish causality. This means that you shouldn’t just rely on physical activity to reverse all of poor sleep’s damage but being active regularly does offer definitive health benefits!