LIH Study Reveals Average Luxembourg Resident Spends Half Day Sitting

A new study published by the Luxembourg Institute of Health (LIH) has revealed that the average Luxembourg resident spends half their day sitting down.

According to LIH, whilst Luxembourg ranks highly in the European Union (EU) in terms of physical activity, residents are inactive twelve hours a day on average.

In this first objective assessment on physical activity in Luxembourg, researchers from the Deptartment of Precision Health at LIH found that while overall adherence to recommended levels of physical activity is high, so too is sedentary time.

In 2021, Luxembourg officially adopted the World Health Organization's (WHO) guidelines for adult physical activity. These amount to 150-300 minutes of moderate physical activity and 75-150 minutes of vigorous physical activity per week.

LIH recalled that it is widely known that physical activity is necessary and beneficial for overall health, and that any kind of physical activity is preferable to being sedentary. In the modern digital world, high levels of sedentariness are a major issue with which all developed countries, including Luxembourg, are struggling.

In this vein, the Physical Activity, Sport and Health Research Group led by Dr Laurent Malisoux at LIH carried out a study to measure how well the nation matches up to the WHO guidelines. Although the WHO has no official guidelines regarding sedentary time, the group measured this as well. They obtained data from about 1,100 adult participants who wore accelerometers on their wrists for one week as part of the ORISCAVLUX 2 study on cardiovascular health risk. Accelerometers measure movement and by using them, the group was able to calculate and analyse a variety of metrics related to both physical activity and sedentary behaviour. The participants were also surveyed about their lifestyles, including whether or not they do sports. The group also split the data up and analysed the results based on age, sex, education and other parameters in order to understand the demography of physical activity.

Previous surveys regarding physical activity and sports have consistently ranked Luxembourg as one of the most active countries in the EU and the data from this study corroborates that. The researchers showed that over 98% of Luxembourg residents adhered to the WHO physical activity guidelines, comparable to Finland or Germany. However, they also show that on average, residents spent over twelve hours a day sitting down. These seemingly paradoxical metrics become clear when one looks at the duration of time spent being active.

According to the researchers, if only bouts of physical activity over ten minutes are considered valid, the proportion adhering to WHO physical activity guidelines drops to just 25%, meaning that three quarters of residents did not allot much dedicated time to physical activity. Moreover, the study showed that more than one quarter of total sedentary time was done in time spans of over an hour, whereas in other EU countries it was around 6 to 10%. In a high-income post-industrial economy like Luxembourg where two thirds of the jobs are sedentary, this is "perhaps not very surprising", noted LIH.

Regarding sex differences, the results showed that women performed more low intensity physical activity and men were more sedentary yet performed more high intensity physical activity. Younger people also ranked very highly for physical activity, which decreased with age.

The study also revealed that former smokers were more active than people who had never smoked. Dr Paul Collings, lead author of the study, explained that "this is likely due to multiple reasons, including the fact that smokers who are physically active tend to have greater intention and success in quitting." He added that "we also know that most smokers quit for medical reasons, which means they may be more likely to engage in physical activity as part of the clinical management of conditions, or they may have started to prioritise healthier lifestyle behaviours in response to a health scare."

The researchers advised that due to the established knowledge that long bouts of sedentary time are detrimental to health, public health initiatives in Luxembourg should encourage breaking up sedentary time with periods of low intensity physical activity, especially among people aged 50 and over. They cited other studies that showed that this would not impair productivity at work and that the health benefits would be considerable. They also suggested that people dedicate more time to physical activity in general, especially low intensity physical activity. "For most people it will be possible to replace some daily sedentary time with low intensity physical activity and evidence suggests that this will help reduce the risk of cardio-metabolic disease," stated Dr Collings.

The researchers also admitted some limitations in their study, such as the fact that the accelerometers may register some standing time as sedentary, as they have no way to measure posture.

The study is available online at https://ijbnpa.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12966-022-01380-3.