Six steps to premature death that you might be taking without knowing it

A long, healthy life is what we're all hoping for, but according to scientists, we might be hastening our own demise without realising it

Care giver: Looking after yourself now means avoiding six serious health risks

Activities and habits which many of us adopt on a daily basis may be sending us towards a premature death.
The march towards an early grave can be hastened by illnesses, virus or other conditions, but boffins have revealed the lifestyle choices which might be ruining our chances of longevity, and contributing to our shuffling off this mortal coil.

A new study, published in PLOS Medicine, has used six years of mortality data for Australians to isolate the six ways we're living poorly, with more than 230,000 people taking part.
Read more: Happiness does NOT lead to longer life - but poor health can make you unhappy
Researcher Dr Melody Ding, from the University of Sydney, said: "To examine specific patterns of lifestyle risk behaviors, 96 variables representing all possible mutually exclusive combinations of smoking, high alcohol intake, physical inactivity, poor diet, prolonged sitting, and short/long sleep duration were created.

A higher rating in each of the six categories leads participants to being given a higher risk.
In fact the researchers estimate that almost a third (31.3%) of years of life lost could be avoided if all the participants had a score of zero in cases where the eventual cause of death includes those risk factors.

However researchers say the results may be limited by participants reporting one specific risk factor while having another characteristic which was responsible for their early death, as well as those whose risk factors are caused by an illness, rather than lifestyle choice.
Dr Ding added: "The prevalent combinations of risk factors suggest new strategic targeting for chronic disease prevention."

So here's a breakdown of what you might be doing to kill yourself on the off-chance that you can stop, enabling you to live long and prosper.

Lying in - or not

Lazy mornings: But spending too much time asleep - or even too little - can have a negative health impact

Dr Melody Ding, from the University of Sydney, said: "Short and long sleep durations were separated as two different risk factors, as their associations with mortality may be explained by different mechanisms."
Independent sleep expert Dr Neil Stanley told the Daily Mail that keeping regular hours is the key, he added.

Sitting down

 

Take a break: Sitting on your bottom for too long is a newly-identified risk factor

Dr Ding again: "This analysis investigated four established and two novel risk factors, namely, prolonged sitting and unhealthy sleep duration, which may be added to behavioral indices or risk combinations to quantify health risk."

Smoking

 

Time to quit: Smoking is one of the long-understood health-affecting activities

Combining smoking with high alcohol intake and any other factors put participants in the category 'most likely to die early'.

Drinking booze

 

Drink up: But boozing to excess has been proven to have a negative impact on the body

Previous research has identified important risk factors such as alcohol consumption can have an impact on length of life.

Eating junk

Poor choice: The lack of essential vitamins and minerals in the diet can be compounded by non-essential fats

Poor diet can reduce lifespan by giving your body too much of the bad stuff and not enough healthy nutrients.

Doing nothing

 

Bored stiff: But inactivity is another bad move for good health

Inactivity is another of the 'sedentary' offences which can lead to health problems.