New research reported in the British Journal of Sports Medicine has found that the detrimental effects of a poor diet on mortality risk are not counteracted by exercise, showing that you cannot ‘outrun’ a poor diet.
Study participants with both high levels of physical activity and a high-quality diet were found to have the lowest mortality risk.
The University of Sydney-led researchers analysed the independent and joint effects of diet and physical activity with all-cause, cardiovascular disease and cancer mortality using a large population-based sample of 360 600 adults from the UK Biobank.
High quality diets were defined as including at least five portions of fruit and vegetables every day, two portions of fish per week and lower consumption of red meat, particularly processed meat.
The study revealed that for those who had high levels of physical activity and a high-quality diet, their mortality risk was reduced by 17% from all causes, 19% from cardiovascular disease and 27% from selected cancers, as compared with those with the worst diet who were physically inactive.
Lead author Associate Professor Melody Ding at the University of Sydney said: “Both regular physical activity and a healthy diet play an important role in promoting health and longevity.
“Some people may think they could offset the impacts of a poor diet with high levels of exercise or offset the impacts of low physical activity with a high-quality diet, but the data shows that unfortunately this is not the case,” said Associate Professor Melody Ding, the study’s lead author.
A small collection of studies have previously found that high-intensity exercise may counteract detrimental physiological responses to over-eating.
However, the long-term effects on how diet and physical activity interact with each other remained less explored. The study findings confirm the importance of both physical activity and quality diet in all-cause and cause-specific mortality.
“This study reinforces the importance of both physical activity and diet quality for achieving the greatest reduction in mortality risk,” said Assoc Prof Ding.
“Public health messages and clinical advice should focus on promoting both physical activity and dietary guidelines to promote healthy longevity.”
Source: The University of Sydney
