Muscle Strengthening Linked to Lower Risk of Dying

Spending just 30-60 minutes a week on muscle Strengthening exercises could be enough to significantly reduce your risk of dying, even with no extra cardio exercise like running or cycling added in. Based on an analysis of 16 previous studies, covering up to 25 years of research and sample sizes up to nearly 480,000 people, muscle-Strengthening activities were associated with a 10-20 percent lower risk of death from all causes.

The risks of cardiovascular disease (CVD), diabetes, and cancer were particularly affected. While this link has been reported on before, in this case, the scientists wanted to see if there was a sweet spot in terms of how much muscle-building activity would be best in terms of reducing mortality risk.

While this link has been reported on before, in this case, the scientists wanted to see if there was a sweet spot in terms of how much muscle-building activity would be best in terms of reducing mortality risk. They found that the benefits of muscle Strengthening for more than an hour a week aren’t quite as clear when compared with various causes of death – here, the curve tends to be J-shaped, so the change in risk is less noticeable over that 60-minute mark.

Muscle-Strengthening activities were inversely associated with the risk of all-cause mortality and major non-communicable diseases, including CVD, total cancer, diabetes, and lung cancer. However, the influence of a higher volume of muscle-Strengthening activities on all-cause mortality, CVD, and comprehensive cancer is unclear when considering the observed J-shaped associations.