A Walk a Day Keeps the Colds Away

A Walk a Day Keeps the Colds Away

30 minutes a day could cut your number of colds in half(Nov. 7, 2006)--Add exercise to that bowl of chicken soup if you want to ward off the common cold.
Older women who walked for a half-hour daily for a year reported half the number of colds as non-exercisers, researchers report in the November issue of the American Journal of Medicine.
"There's been a lot of anecdotal evidence that exercise prevents infection, and colds in particular," said study author Cornelia M. Ulrich, an associate member of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle.
Ulrich's team evaluated 115 overweight Seattle-area women who had previously shunned regular exercise. All were past menopause, and averaged 61 years of age.
Fifty-three of the women were assigned to the exercise group, where they spent 30 minutes daily, five days a week, doing moderate-intensity activity like brisk walking. Another 62 were assigned to a control group, which only attended a weekly 45-minute stretching class.
"Overall, the non-exercisers got two times the number of colds," Ulrich said. It's not clear why exercise proved useful in battling colds, but one possibility is that it improves the body's immune system. The effects accumulate over time.
"I think it is another set of data that now adds to the growing awareness that one of the most powerful ways of keeping your sick days down is to do nearly daily [physical] activity," said David Nieman, a professor of health and exercise science at Appalachian State University, Boone, N.C. Nieman's own research has found that walkers experienced half the number of days of cold symptoms as non-exercisers.

igsean

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