New guidelines on fitness say, doesn’t matter how you get there, just hit 150 active minutes a week

New guidelines out on fitness suggest you get 150 minutes of moderate activity a week to stay healthy.

How that happens, however, is up for discussion.

The new Federal Health and Human Services Department guidelines aren’t so picky — just hit 150.

“What was interesting that they noted, it was a total time moving, not the exercise that mattered, as long as the activity raised your heart rate so it was at moderate to vigorous,” Sue Karpinski, with Mayo Health System in La Crosse, said.

Unfortunately, that’s not happening with many. The report says just one in three adults is getting 150 and, even worse, one in five teens.

Karpinski advice was, essentially, to get off the phone and go play.

With the old guidelines, Karpinski also noted that wording might have pushed people away from exercise.

“One of the previous guidelines expressed it in bouts,” she said. “Some people, because they couldn’t do the 10-minute bouts, so they just did nothing at all.”