Almost everyone does this every day, and a new study found it dramatically increases cancer risk

A major new study from the United Kingdom has uncovered a disturbing correlation between prolonged sedentary behavior and a heightened risk of developing cancer and dying from the disease. The research indicates that even brief interruptions to sitting time can substantially mitigate this danger, affecting individuals irrespective of their regular exercise routines.

The study, published in PLOS Medicine, analyzed data from over 91,000 adults who wore wrist-worn activity trackers for seven days. Researchers examined the link between sedentary time, cancer incidence, and cancer mortality. They discovered that individuals who incorporated physical activity into their sitting periods faced a considerably lower risk of cancer-related death.

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Just get up. That's the main message.

Specifically, those who replaced one hour of sitting with at least an hour of light activity, such as slow walking or household chores, showed a 12% reduction in cancer mortality. Replacing 30 minutes of sitting with moderate activity, like brisk walking, lowered the cancer death rate by 8%. The most striking finding was that even five minutes of vigorous exercise, such as fast walking, after a period of sitting led to a 22% decrease in cancer mortality.

Dr. Heidi Prather, founder of the Program for Lifestyle Medicine at the Hospital for Special Surgery in New York, who was not involved in the study, stressed the simplicity of the solution. "Just get up. That's the main message," she told HuffPost. "Obviously, we are all tied to a computer, a car, or something else that keeps us inactive, but just breaking that inactivity with any kind of activity, according to their data, yields very impressive results. Not only in terms of cancer death, but the risk of developing the disease itself."

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Obviously, we are all tied to a computer, a car, or something else that keeps us inactive, but just breaking that inactivity with any kind of activity, according to their data, yields very impressive results. Not only in terms of cancer death, but the risk of developing the disease itself.