Adapted from BMJ 4-11 April 2026
A new study in Nature Medicine indicates that when it comes to physical activity, more people achieve physical activity targets through the nature of their work or from their usual mode of travel or commuting. The World Health Organisation population household survey also noted that there were large discrepancies in overall physical activity between genders and nations. The most sedentary were wealthy men in high income countries, and the most active were women in low income countries.
More than 80% of the population in low income countries meet WHO physical activity guidelines. Just over 60% of people in high income countries make this target. Only 40% of wealthy men in high income countries manage this.
About 70% of the population meet this target just from the work they do in low income countries. 40% of the population in high income countries manage adequate activity from work alone. (My comment: not too shabby!)
Just over 60% of the population meet physical activity goals during transport such as walking or biking in low income countries. This fell to 20% in high income countries.
About 7% of the population in low income countries had active leisure pursuits compared with about 25% of the population in high income countries.
Medium income countries performed in between the high and low income countries on all measured outcomes.
My comment: What does this tell us? I think this tells us that what you have to do almost every day regarding physical activity, matters more than what you can do now and again. If you have an active job and an active commute, great for you. You probably don’t need to be a gym bunny, or member of a sports club. or go hillwalking at weekends, and ski in the winter unless you want to. But 60% of us in high income countries don’t have active jobs. (I was surprised it wasn’t higher than this.) 80% of us drive or get to work by other means than our feet or bikes. Only 25% of us bother with active leisure pursuits. Maybe it would be easier overall if we did get more routinised physical activity in every day by getting off a stop earlier, parking further away, or going for a walk at lunch time or after work. Meanwhile governments and councils could do more to make walking or biking safer and more available to the working population.
