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Twenty minutes of exercise a day ‘wards off flu’: Risk can be reduced by 10% with regular activity

  • Twenty minutes of exercise a day reduces risk of flu-like illness
  • Moderate exercise appears to have no effect, so workout must be intense
  • Researchers also confirm last winter had lowest flu rate in recent years

By
Jenny Hope


PUBLISHED:

19:18 EST, 16 March 2014

|
UPDATED:

19:18 EST, 16 March 2014

Exercising for 20 minutes a day could help stave off flu, claim researchers.

They estimate that two and a half hours of vigorous exercise a week cuts the risk of flu-like illnesses by around 10 per cent.

The figures come from Flusurvey, the online flu study run by the London School of Hygiene Tropical Medicine based on 4,800 participants.

Researchers have found that 20 minutes of intense exercise every day helps ward off flu-like illnesses

Findings suggest that 100 cases of flu per 1,000 people could be prevented just by stepping up exercise.

However, moderate exercise appears to have little effect on rates of flu-like illness which means the intensity is all important, say researchers.

In the UK people are advised to do 150 minutes of moderate activity such as gardening, dancing or brisk walking, or 75 minutes of vigorous exercise including playing sport, running or aerobics every week. Three out of four Britons fail to achieve this.

Other findings from Flusurvey confirm that reports of flu viruses this winter are amongst the lowest in recent years.

Over the winter flu season, only 4.7 per cent of reports were positive for flu-like symptoms compared to 6.0 per cent last year – which was another season of low activity.

Rates are also down among children with just 5.0 per cent reporting symptoms this flu season compared to 7.9 per cent in the previous year.

As children have been identified as being the biggest spreaders of flu, Flusurvey researchers suggest that flu cases have been curbed partly because of low rates among young people.

Figures have also shown that last winter had some of the lowest rates of flu infection in recent years due in part to the large amount of rain and mild weather

Dr Alma Adler, ambassador for National Science Engineering Week and Research Fellow at the London School of Hygiene Tropical Medicine said; ‘We’re really interested in the preliminary findings around fitness activity and flu-like illness, as exercise is something that everyone can do to reduce your chance of having flu.

‘We need to treat this result cautiously as these are preliminary findings, however they are consistent with findings for other conditions and really show the health benefits of exercise.

‘Although many people have dodged the flu bullet this winter, flu can occur at any time, so taking advantage of the better weather is a great opportunity to get out and get fit to ward off flu this spring.’

The annual UK Flusurvey, now in its fifth year, is an online system for measuring influenza trends and uniquely collects data directly from the public through an online questionnaire at flusurvey.org.uk.

Findings are reported directly to the government and are vital in presenting a full picture of flu in the UK, providing data which is missed through current surveillance as many people affected by flu do not visit their doctor or local hospital.

The data is supplied weekly to Public Health England’s national flu surveillance programmes.

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Comments (10)

what you think

The comments below have not been moderated.

Opine,

England, United Kingdom,

1 hour ago

I have found that good nutrition, supplements, exercise and rest helps me ward off the cold and flu.

Sulla,

Banff, United Kingdom,

1 hour ago

Sacrificing a goat works if there is an “r” in the month.

I-give-up,

Planet Earth, United Kingdom,

2 hours ago

Exercising for 20 minutes a day could help stave off flu. Are these “experts” talking about the “real” flu or just a cold, they are two totally different things. God save us from “experts”.

Gordon,

Romford,

2 hours ago

Wonder who funds these clowns to put out such rubbish, its unprovable and not worth the effort.

MikeyMikes,

london, United Kingdom,

3 hours ago

Talk about state the bleeding obvious!!!!

RedRoseAndy,

Hatfield,

6 hours ago

…The aching that one gets with the common cold is due to less oxygen getting to the muscles because breathing is being restricted, this symptom passes quickly when you increase the deepness of your breathing for a few minutes, when the muscles receive the quantity of oxygen that they need the aching stops. You will find that it is not possible to breath deeply all day, so the mind will ensure that you forget to do it when you have enough oxygen. Just simply breath deeply whenever you remember to, cease if this treatment makes you feel dizzy.

The fuzzy head is dealt with in the same way, just imagine the brain getting all the oxygen it needs while breathing deeply and it soon does, the head becomes as clear as if there were no infection. When you try this you will probably come to the conclusion that we have some control over how much oxygen gets to the brain, and perhaps that the common cold interferes with this mechanism in some way…

cynical,

plymouth, United Kingdom,

8 hours ago

and having a flu jab can ward it off pretty much 100% – since having one regularly i have not even had a cold – so what does that prove ????

Mike Man,

Kowloon, Hong Kong,

1 hour ago

No way. I get one every year and still fall sick.

No Wuckers,

Legoland, Lebanon,

54 minutes ago

The flu is a virus,the common cold is bacterial.

DrMallard,

West Palm Beach FL USA,

9 hours ago

There’s a bit of a difference between ‘warding off’ the flu and decreasing your chance of getting it by 10%. “There are three kinds of lies – lies, damned lies, and statistics.” – Mark Twain

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