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Fitness

The Laziest Countries In the World

Ever wondered what countries in the world do the least amount of fitness? A compilation of worldwide data shows some surprises.

What Country Moves The Least?

When it comes to physical inactivity, I often find Americans castigating their country, but they actually are not the laziest population out there. For the British, things are much worse and the Maltese apparently hardly move at all.

That is at least according to data published by medical journal Lancet, where researchers scoured far and wide for data on how many people in different countries do what is considered the least amount of physical activity to stay healthy: a weekly 5×30 minutes of moderate physical activity or 3×20 minutes of vigorous physical activity.

The Top Ten Laziest Countries

Here they are, the top ten countries that like to take things easy, least to most (well…) active:

CountryPercentage Of Inactive People
Malta71.9%
Swaziland69%
Saudi Arabia68.8%
Serbia68.3%
Argentina68.3%
Micronesia66.3%
Kuwait64.5%
United Kingdom63.3%
United Arab Emirates62.5%
Malaysia61.4%

 
Some of these countries are really, really hot and people there may simply lack air-conditioned facilities where they could get active. Who feels like doing “vigorous” exercise when it’s 113°F (45°C)? But it is a bit harder to come up with an excuse for the UK, isn’t it?  (Here I will be waiting for cheap puns about British weather: “too wet”.)

The Top Ten Most Active Countries

Now let us look at the countries who practically can’t stand still, sorted from most to least active:

CountryPercentage Of Inactive People
Bangladesh4.7%
Mozambique7.1%
Comoros8.3%
Benin9.1%
Mongolia9.4%
Malawi10.2%
Cambodia11.2%
Guinea12.1%
Myanmar (Burma)12.7%
Vietnam15.3%

 
If you can provide a reasoning why people in Bangladesh, Mozambique, Cambodia et al. move this much, shoot! From the top of my head, I can’t.

Where Is Your Country?

Here are the countries most of my readership comes from, sorted by most to least active once more:

CountryPercentage Of Inactive People
Greece15.6%
India15.6%
Netherlands18.2%
Russian Federation20.8%
Germany28%
Bosnia-Herzegovina33.6%
Canada33.9%
Australia37.9%
Pakistan40.4%
United States40.5%
Sweden44.2%
Ireland53.2%
Malaysia61.4%
United Arab Emirates62.5%
United Kingdom63.3%

 
Congratulations to the Greek, who are the most active country in Europe and worldwide tie with my visitors from India. The Netherlands don’t do much worse and my own Germany is somewhere in the middle. That the US is more physically active than the UK does come up as a bit of surprise, doesn’t it?

Picture courtesy of David Surtees. Raw data provided by The Guardian.

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Latest Comments

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4 Comments

  1. Andrew says:
    July 26, 2012 at 5:32 pm

    I’m Greek and i have to admit that i was surprised to see that we are the most active people. I’m also surprised that UK is so far down. Felt proud for the first time after a long while of so much negative attention. 🙂

    Reply
    • evilcyber says:
      July 26, 2012 at 7:35 pm

      Heh, Andrew, rest assured, the Greek people have a lot to be proud of!

      Reply
  2. Brane says:
    July 26, 2012 at 9:24 pm

    This is so not true… Im from Serbia and we’re on 4th place with 68.3% of the laziest? We are known as a small sport nation country and its true, U can see basketball courts on every corner and its full of kids and people, running paths, gym’s are also full (open and closed ones), football fields, schools, you name it… and all this on daily basis. And most of the guys and girls are VERY fit. I don’t know how they managed to get this info, but it’s totaly, must to say, rubbish. 😀

    Reply
    • evilcyber says:
      July 26, 2012 at 9:59 pm

      I only put the the data into tables. For all I know, Serbians could be the fittest people in the world 😉

      Reply

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