Something to think about the next time you settle in for some television binge-watching: a study has linked excessive TV watching with some of the leading causes of death found in the United States.
In a study that followed the health history of more than 220,000 people aged 50 to 71, the researchers found that the more TV those older adults watched, the more likely they were to die from conditions including heart disease, diabetes, cancer, Parkinson's disease, liver disease or flu/pneumonia.
The research findings were in line with a growing body of studies indicating too much sitting can result in a number of adverse health effects, the study authors say.
"We know that television viewing is the most prevalent leisure-time sedentary behavior and our working hypothesis is that it is an indicator of overall physical inactivity," says lead author Sarah Keadle at the U.S. National Cancer Institute.
About 80 percent of American adults watch an average of three-and-a-half hours of television each day, researchers said.
People who watch that amount daily had a 15 percent higher risk of death during the 15 years of the study period than those who spent less than an hour each day in front of the TV, they said.
The risk went up to 47 percent higher in people watching television for seven or more hours daily, they reported in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.
The link between television viewing and elevated risks of death during the period of the study remained even after other risk factors such as alcohol consumption, smoking and calorie intake were accounted for, they said.
The association between TV watching and elevated risk was somewhat reduced by exercise but not totally eliminated, the researchers say.
Still, Keadle suggests, for people wanting to reduce the hours they spend in sedentary TV viewing, exercise would be the best choice for a replacement activity.
The fact that the study findings applied to an older group of participants is especially worrisome, she says.
"Older adults watch the most TV of any demographic group in the U.S.," she says.
With an increasingly aging population, extended TV viewing and its possible link to risks of death is "a more important target for public health intervention than previously recognized," she suggests.
