Americans’ Activity Continues Decline

A few words about the move less part of the eat more, move less trend that took off in the last half of the 20th century: Researchers at the University of North Carolina have run the numbers on the future of movement, our movement, or at least what’s left of it. A UNC news release reports that when researchers at the university’s school of public health used extensive data from the 1960s onward to determine how people around the world spend their time and how they move in the course of their daily lives, they found that forecasts are bleak. Using a physiological measure called metabolic equivalent of task (MET), which describes the amount of energy spent in accomplishing a task, the study determined that by 2020, the average American adult will expend about 190 MET hours per week. Yikes! The researchers point out that a person who slept 24 hours in a day would expend 151 MET hours per week, and an active adult who did vigorous activity for 30 minutes to an hour every day, but otherwise had a desk job, would expend between 240 and 265 MET-hours per week. Read more from UNC.