Cited by 8,215Physical Activity and HealthObesity, Physical Activity, DietHealthcare Systems and Public Health

Effect of physical inactivity on major non-communicable diseases worldwide: An analysis of burden of disease and life expectancy

Open access
Lee, I-Min, Shiroma, Eric J, Lobelo, Felipe, Puska, Pekka, Blair, Steven N, Katzmarzyk, Peter T·2012·The Lancet

Abstract

Background Strong evidence shows that physical inactivity increases the risk of many adverse health conditions, including major non-communicable diseases such as coronary heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and breast and colon cancers, and shortens life expectancy. Because much of the world's population is inactive, this link presents a major public health issue. We aimed to quantify the eff ect of physical inactivity on these major non-communicable diseases by estimating how much disease could be averted if inactive people were to become active and to estimate gain in life expectancy at the population level.Methods For our analysis of burden of disease, we calculated population attributable fractions (PAFs) associated with physical inactivity using conservative assumptions for each of the major non-communicable diseases, by country, to estimate how much disease could be averted if physical inactivity were eliminated. We used life-table analysis to estimate gains in life expectancy of the population.Findings Worldwide, we estimate that physical inactivity causes 6% (ranging from 3·2% in southeast Asia to 7·8% in the eastern Mediterranean region) of the burden of disease from coronary heart disease, 7% (3·9-9·6) of type 2 diabetes, 10% (5·6-14·1) of breast cancer, and 10% (5·7-13·8) of colon cancer. Inactivity causes 9% (range 5·1-12·5) of premature mortality, or more than 5·3 million of the 57 million deaths that occurred worldwide in 2008. If inactivity were not eliminated, but decreased instead by 10% or 25%, more than 533 000 and more than 1·3 million deaths, respectively, could be averted every year. We estimated that elimination of physical inactivity would increase the life expectancy of the world's population by 0·68 (range 0·41-0·95) years.Interpretation Physical inactivity has a major health eff ect worldwide. Decrease in or removal of this unhealthy behaviour could improve health substantially.Funding None.

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1016/s0140-6736(12)61031-9

Cites

27 of 27 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Claims the paper makes

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

The self-check needs the paper’s full text.

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

Research works printed but not linked: 1

  1. [24]Crimmins EM Preston SH Cohen B Explaining divergent levels of longevity in high-income countries (chapters 3 and 5) National Academies Press 2011

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Authors
Lee, I.-M., Shiroma, E. J., Lobelo, F., Puska, P., Blair, S. N., & Katzmarzyk, P. T.
Affiliations
  • Brigham and Women's Hospital (US)
  • Harvard University (US)
  • Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (US)
  • Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare (FI)
  • University of South Carolina (US)
  • Pennington Biomedical Research Center (US)
Corresponding author
Lee, I-Min
Venue
The Lancet
Publisher
Elsevier BV
Published
2012-07
Volume
380
Issue
9838
Pages
219-229
ISSN
  • 0099-5355 (ISSN-L)
  • 0140-6736
OpenAlex
W2096528587
Cited by
8,215
References
27
Citations by year
2026: 394 · 2025: 558 · 2024: 683 · 2023: 555 · 2022: 672 · 2021: 809 · 2020: 817 · 2019: 671 · 2018: 668 · 2017: 612 · 2016: 568 · 2015: 462 · 2014: 408 · 2013: 283 · 2012: 47
FWCI
257.21
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • The Lancet (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (acceptedVersion)
  • PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
  • UWA Profiles and Research Repository (UWA) (submittedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
  • University of Southern Denmark Research Portal (University of Southern Denmark) (submittedVersion)
  • Zurich Open Repository and Archive (University of Zurich) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
Funders
  • National Institutes of Health
  • Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
  • National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (HL-007575, T32HL007575)
  • National Cancer Institute (CA154647, R01CA154647)
Topics
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Physiology › Physical Activity and Health
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health › Obesity, Physical Activity, Diet
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Epidemiology › Healthcare Systems and Public Health
Keywords
physical inactivity, non-communicable diseases, coronary artery disease, type 2 diabetes, breast cancer, colon cancer, premature mortality, life expectancy, population attributable fraction, disease burden, mortality averted, global health
MeSH terms
Breast Neoplasms, Colonic Neoplasms, Coronary Disease, Diabetes Mellitus, Type 2, Female, Humans, Life Expectancy, Risk Factors, Global Health, Exercise, Life Tables, Cost of Illness

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review