Years living as a couch potato can leave you unable to walk

LIVING a couch potato lifestyle in middle age can result in people being unable to walk in their later years, according to new research.

Scientists found that people over the age of 50 who spend evenings bingeing on box sets are putting their health and mobility in serious danger.

The study revealed that the middle-aged who watch more than five hours of TV per day, and exercise fewer than three hours a week, are more than three times as likely to have difficulty walking later in life.

Lead author Dr Loretta DiPietro, of George Washington University, US, said: “TV viewing is a very potent risk factor for disability in older age.

“Sitting and watching TV for long periods, especially in the evening, has got to be one of the most dangerous things that older people can do.”

She recommends that elderly TV viewers should even march on the spot during ad breaks to keep up their exercise.

Researchers analysed a group of men and women age 50 to 71 who were all healthy and active at the start of the

scientists hail gene therapy which kills cancer cells

THE US has approved a cancer treatment which genetically alters cells.

CAR-T cell treatment is the first gene therapy to be made available and one of a wave of expensive custom-made “living drugs” being tested against blood cancers.

The US Food and Drug Administration agency has hailed its approval as historic. Dr Stephan Grupp, of the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, who treated the study in 1995. Ten years later, nearly 30 per cent reported having difficulty walking or being unable to walk at all.

Those who watched five or more hours of TV per day had a 65 per cent greater risk of a mobility disability compared with those who watched fewer than two hours of TV per day.

The findings showed that increasing levels of total sitting and TV time in combination with fewer than three hours per week of physical activity were especially harmful, resulting in first patient, said the therapy has already proved a life-saver.

He said: “This is a brand new way of treating cancer... a girl who’d been near death but now is cancer-free for five years and counting. That’s enormously exciting.”

CAR-T helps turbocharge T cells of the immune system rather than focus on disease-causing genes.

The cells are filtered from a patient’s blood and an acceleration of risk. However, the people in the most physically active group – more than seven hours exercise per week – were not associated with excess mobility disability.

Increasing amounts of TV viewing time were related to the likelihood of a disability.

Other studies have found too much sitting is a health hazard even for older people who meet physical activity guidelines of at least 150 minutes per week.

Dr DiPietro said TV viewing in the evening may be especially reprogrammed to be home to a “chimeric antigen receptor”.

The revved-up cells are returned and multiply to fight the disease.

It is first being aimed at a common paediatric cancer, acute lymphoblastic leukaemia. In 63 advanced patients, 83 per cent went into remission. Drugs firm Novartis says the therapy will cost hundreds of thousands of pounds each. detrimental to health because it is not broken up with short bouts of activity.

She said: “Our findings suggest older people who want to remain fit must ramp up daily physical activity and reduce the amount of time they spend sitting.”

Dr DiPietro, whose findings were published in The Journal of Gerontology: Medical Sciences, added: “To stay active and healthy as you age, move more and sit less – throughout the day every day.”