Researchers find counting steps healthier than counting calories | UVa

“A weight-neutral approach to treating obesity-related health conditions may be as, or more, effective than a weight-loss-centered approach, and could avoid pitfalls associated with repeated weight loss failure,” their research states.

Angadi said that exercise is considered part of most weight-loss plans, but only as a means to an end. In fact, the National Institutes of Health’s information page on healthy weight focuses on dieting and weight loss and includes exercise mostly as a means to lose and maintain weight.

However, studies have shown that exercise not only improves organ function but actually improves the metabolism in fat cells, making even the fat cells healthier, they said. Also, a patient’s fitness and general health improves medical outcomes regardless of weight, their research shows.

“For far too long the conventional view has been to look at exercise as a way to burn calories and not think about all of the other massive benefits of what happens when you exercise,” Angadi said. “The fact is most people who try to lose weight and lose it, gain it back. That’s not a personality issue. There are strong biological reasons why that happens.”

Gaesser is no stranger to the idea of exercise being more important than weight loss in reducing the risk of dying. In 1995 his book “Big Fat Lies,” which detailed exercise as more important than weight loss created controversy among scientists, researchers and those in the weight loss industry.