Exercise Does More For Some Than For Others

Life isn’t fair, and neither, apparently, is exercise: it appears to help some people more than others. Researchers at Brown University analyzed the results of 160 clinical trials of the cardiometabolic benefits of exercise showing which health indicators improve most with physical activity and for whom. Who were the winners? Men, people under 50, and people battling type 2 diabetes or other cardiovascular conditions. A Brown University news release reports that the researchers also found that while exercise appears to affect total cholesterol, lowering “bad” LDL cholesterol for at least some people and raising “good” HDL for most, “the proportion of cardiovascular disease risk that could have been reduced by exercise via effects on total cholesterol and LDL cholesterol is much lower than what has been observed previously.” Instead, some of the significant benefits of exercise appear to lie in reducing insulin resistance and inflammation based on how those biomarkers performed in the studies.