Walk an Hour a Day to Prevent Breast Cancer


by Bob Curley on October 28, 2010



Post-menopausal women can cut their risk of breast cancer by 15 percent by taking a brisk, one-hour walk each day, new research suggests.



Reuters reported Oct. 27 that a study involving about 100,000 women also found that women who increased their activity even marginally after menopause were 10 percent less likely to get the disease compared to those who remained sedentary.



Researchers tracked the women for 20 years. They found that brisk walking seemed to provide the greatest protection against breast cancer, and that women didn’t need to engage in vigorous workouts to see benefits.



Exercising “is one of the few breast-cancer risk factors that women can do something about, and it’s never too late,” said lear researcher A. Heather Eliassen of Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School.



The findings were published in the Oct. 25, 2010 issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine