Heart disease is the leading cause of death in the United States.
Someone dies every 34 seconds in the U.S. from cardiovascular disease.
If you want to live a long and healthy life, you must avoid heart disease.
Fortunately, there is a simple thing you can do to drastically reduce your risk.
Take at least 15,000 steps per day.
A study of postal workers showed the stark difference in heart disease risk between those who walked all day as part of their jobs and those who had sedentary office jobs.
The study looked at over 100 postal workers in Glasgow, Scotland. Half of the group were office workers and the other half were walking/delivery workers.
Those who had delivery routes were much healthier — including smaller waist circumference, lower body weight, lower triglycerides, lower LDL (bad) cholesterol, and higher HDL (good) cholesterol.
Slashing heart disease risk is where physical activity really shined.
Walking more than 15,000 steps per day was associated with zero risk factors for heart disease.
The results were linear — the more steps per day, the lower the heart disease risk, culminating with zero risk at 15,000 steps per day.
On the flip side, the more sedentary time per day, the higher the disease risk. All important biomarkers moved in the wrong direction with more time sitting.
Taking 15,000 steps is equivalent to walking 7-8 miles, or spending 7 hours per day upright.
Of course this flies in the face of our current culture and most people’s working conditions.
But if you want to live longer, you need to push back against this default environment.
Most people sit at their desks for the bulk of the day. Most people get heart disease. Don’t be one of those people.
Find a way to take 15,000 steps per day and you can avoid the #1 killer.
Take your calls walking. Schedule walking meetings instead of sitting in conference rooms or coffee shops. Ditch your car and walk everywhere instead. Find a job that keeps you active or could at least involve an active commute to get there.
These things aren’t easy. But they are important.
It isn’t a complicated formula to eliminate heart disease risk.
All it takes is 15,000 steps.