New Delhi: Engaging in physical activities for fitness isn't a part of life for many in our country. As per a recent study, around 42% of men and 57% of women are insufficiently physically active in India, while the South Asian region also ranked the second highest in terms of adults being insufficiently physically active. The study, published in the Lancet Global Health journal, was done by an international team of researchers including those from the World Health Organisation. In India, a little over 22% of the adults engaged in insufficient physical activity in the year 2000, while in 2010, close to 34% of the adults were insufficiently physically active. The study projected that in 2030, 60 per cent of adults could be insufficiently engaging in physical activity, should current trends continue.
A global trend
The study found that around the world, older adults, both men and women, aged 60 years and above, were increasingly engaging in insufficient physical activity. Physical inactivity is known to heighten the risk of developing non-communicable diseases, including diabetes and heart disease. Rising levels of physical activity, along with an increasingly sedentary lifestyle, are contributing to an increase in cases of these diseases and burdening healthcare systems around the world, according to the WHO. A 2023 Indian Council of Medical Research-India Diabetes (ICMR-INDIAB) study, published in The Lancet Diabetes and Endocrinology journal, estimated that 101 million people in India were diabetic in 2021, and about 315 million had hypertension the same year. Further, 254 million were estimated to have obesity and 185 million were estimated to have high levels of LDL or 'bad' cholesterol, according to the study.
