Taper down the TV watching, people, it’s not a very healthy proposition. More than three or four hours of TV watching daily, has shown a link to deaths because of heart disease, diabetes and cancer in U.S., state the researchers of a new study.
Research conducted earlier has shown a connection between TV watching and death due to cardiovascular disease and cancer. This time a study done on approx 2,21,000 people falling in the age group of 50-71 years, was conducted by the National Cancer Institute in U.S . The researchers had chosen the sample in which people were hale, hearty and disease free at the beginning of the study. The mortality connection between TV watching and heart disease and cancer was confirmed.
Lead researcher of the study Sarah K. Keadle from the U.S. National Cancer Institute said “We know that television viewing is the most prevalent leisure-time sedentary behavior and our working hypothesis is that it is an indicator of overall physical inactivity.” The leader Ms Keadle, further stated “In this context, our results fit within a growing body of research indicating that too much sitting can have many different adverse health effects.”
You will be astonished that Americans watch television for almost 3.5 hours daily. Multiple studies have shown that there is a link between poor health and TV viewing. The study findings, published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, indicate that there is a link between long hours of television watching daily and death risk, maybe more than most other causes of death like Diabetes, pneumonia, liver disorders Parkinson’s etc.
This may be because physical activities have been replaced by television watching. The researchers “identified new associations with higher risk of death from most of the leading causes of death in the U.S., such as, diabetes, influenza/pneumonia, Parkinson’s disease, and liver diseases”, say reports. Television viewing represents sedentary behavior and thus there is physical inactivity so maybe this could be the cause of high risk.
Additional research has to be conducted to come out with more evidence about the associations, as some of them have been reported for the first time and further investigations are needed. Dr. Keadle has also stated that they hope to carry out further studies based on the new evidence regarding sedentary behavior and its role on general well being.
