Listen up baby boomers: "It's never too late to get off your duff and get moving."
So says Dana King of West Virginia University School of Medicine in Morgantown, who has found that Americans born in the wake of the second world war are less healthy than the previous generation.
His team analysed data from two US National Health and Nutrition Examination surveys, focusing on 6000 people who were around the age of 54 between 1988 and 1994 or 2007 and 2010.
They found key differences in the health of the two groups. Over half of the later, baby boomer group didn't exercise at all compared with 17 per cent of their forebears. Likewise, 39 per cent of baby boomers were obese, compared with 29 per cent of the previous generation.
"People who grew up in the 30s, 40s and 50s did a lot more running around, and had fewer labour-saving devices, whereas baby boomers grew up in a time of rapid change, with a decline in walking to school and less activity," says King.
Journal reference: JAMA Internal Medicine, doi.org/kds
If you would like to reuse any content from New Scientist, either in print or online, please contact the syndication department first for permission. New Scientist does not own rights to photos, but there are a variety of licensing options available for use of articles and graphics we own the copyright to.
Have your say
Only subscribers may leave comments on this article. Please log in.
Only personal subscribers may leave comments on this article
Subscribe now to comment.
All comments should respect the New Scientist House Rules. If you think a particular comment breaks these rules then please use the "Report" link in that comment to report it to us.
If you are having a technical problem posting a comment, please contact technical support.
susan g komen kenyon martin kenyon martin big miracle slab city super bowl snacks appleton
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.