Only 25.4 percent of adults met government recommendations for physical activity in 1998 - virtually unchanged from the beginning of the decade, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said. Almost 30 percent reported no physical activity at all. The CDC recommends a half-hour of moderate exercise, like walking, five times a week, or 20 minutes of vigorous exercise, such as running, three times a week. The findings are based on random telephone surveys conducted by health officials in 43 states and the District of Columbia between 1990 and 1998. The CDC warned that the numbers could be off in both directions - made higher by people who exaggerated their physical activity and made lower by people who did not remember all their exercise over a month.
Inactivity can lead to obesity, which is closely tied to diabetes.
Diabetes kills 180,000 Americans a year, and the disease is rising sharply. Part of the problem is that Americans see exercise as an inconvenience, Ham said. But the 30-minute requirement can be broken into chunks as small as 10 minutes, with everyday activities like gardening counting as exercise. This site is using the Aqua 1.2 theme.