Americans haven’t kept step count up post-pandemic: study

While Americans were mostly sitting at home at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, their daily step count was a lot lower, and a new study suggests they still haven’t gotten back into the habit.

The study published in JAMA Network Open looked at steps taken by nearly 5,500 participants — mostly white women with an average age of 53 — who wore the program’s activity trackers.

Daily steps were examined over four years from January 2018 through December 2021. Steps counted between January 1, 2018, through January 31, 2020, were considered pre-COVID, while steps after that date through the end of 2021 were considered post-COVID.

The researchers used data from 6,000 participants in the National Institutes of Health’s All of Us Research Program — which focuses on developing individualized health care — who wore activity trackers for at least 10 hours per day over multiple years.

“On average, people are taking about 600 fewer steps per day than before the pandemic began,” study author Dr. Evan Brittain, associate professor of cardiovascular medicine at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville, said.

There was no difference found in step activity based on sex, obesity, diabetes and other conditions such as coronary artery disease, hypertension or cancer.

However, there were other factors that seemed to have affected the results.

Vulnerable populations, such as those who were socioeconomically disadvantaged, reporting worse mental health and not vaccinated, took the fewest steps.

Age was a differing factor as well, but perhaps in a different way than one might expect.

People over 60 were not affected by the pandemic when it came to step count, the study found, and people between the ages of 18 and 20 were the most affected.

“In fact, we found every 10-year decrease in age was associated with a 243 step reduction per day,” Brittain said.

Brittain warned about the long-term effects this could have on younger people if they don’t keep their steps up.

“If this persists over time, it could certainly raise the risk of cardiovascular disease, obesity, hypertension, diabetes and other conditions strongly linked to being sedentary,” Brittain added. “However, it’s too soon to know whether this trend will last.”

While patients should always be discussing activity levels with their doctors, Brittain suggested that it’s more important for health professionals to discuss due to the impact of COVID-19.

“To me, the main message is really a public health message — raising awareness that COVID-19 appears to have had a lasting impact on people’s behavioral choices when it comes to activity,” Brittain shared.

A September 2022 study found that 10,000 steps every day might help reduce the risk of death from cardiovascular disease, cancer and death from any cause.

That magical number of steps has been linked to a wide variety of health benefits, such as weight loss and lowered risks of cancer, dementia and heart disease — but it turns out to be a myth stemming from no research or evidence.

It was reported last year that the number was actually a Japanese marketing ploy with little scientific basis.

One major study released in March 2022 also debunked the goal, suggesting that anywhere between 6,000 and 8,000 steps a day is just enough, and anything more than 8,000 doesn’t actually count in terms of health benefits.