Scientists from the University of Utah (Salt Lake City) conducted a study on a topic that is sore in every sense for modern people, and especially for IT specialists. They wanted to know how to rid the body of the negative effects of sedentary work. Researchers studied the health status of 3,626 people over several years (including tracking the death rate of the observed). 

Some of the subjects answered the questionnaires, while some used wearable means that track their activity, which increased the reliability of the data. The results were unexpected. No one doubts that the consequences of sedentary work are harmful. In addition to lowering the general tone of the body and problems with the spine, such a daily pastime increases the risks of getting heart problems, overweight, kidney failure, premature death and diabetes. For example, according to a study due next month in the journal Diabetologia, every extra hour of the day spent immobile (like watching TV) increases the risk of diabetes by 3.4 percent. 

Those who try to deal with these difficulties by making standing jobs or even trying to work on the go, like Torvalds , get other problems. It is more difficult to type and concentrate on the go, and, like just standing, such a solution puts an excessive load on the vessels of the legs and the lower back (and this part is generally bad – diseases associated with it are the most common health problems). But the question arises – how to properly load our fragile body, so as not to overload it, but also to raise the tone enough? Should I run in the morning? Run up the stairs to the 10th floor every hour? Or is it enough to just walk down the hallway? It turned out that just standing is not a sufficient load for the body and has little effect on the mortality factor (at least for those people who stand for several minutes an hour, and not all the time). Those who spent a few minutes every hour walking significantly reduced their risk of premature death. Just two minutes of leisurely walks per hour reduce mortality by a third compared to people who don’t get up at all. And, of course, the more minutes of sitting was replaced by walking, the better health indicators became. 

An additional, but not very significant decrease in mortality was recorded in those participants in the experiment who, in addition to walking, performed simple exercises (although there were quite a few such people among the subjects, and statistically this increase is not so convincing). Of course, the relationship between improved health and regular walking has not been strictly proven – it is only clear that walking has something to do with reducing health risks – this is how Dr. Srinivasan Bedu, the professor of medicine who led the study, carefully explains the research results. But it is logical to assume that regular walking has a positive effect on metabolism, overall tone, burns excess calories, and is generally unlikely to harm a person. The main thing is to observe the regularity of the loads – even very intense loads once a day, according to some studies , do not have a noticeable effect on health if you do not get up all day later.