‘€œThe findings indicate that the potential effects of web and mobile phone technology are roughly the same size as the average effects of targeted physical activity interventions, suggesting that the greatest potential to increase population level physical activity might be through the creation of supportive policies outside the realms of health in sectors such as communication,’€ explains Michael Pratt from the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention in the USA, who led the research.  

With an estimated four billion users worldwide, text messaging is a promising delivery mechanism for interventions to promote physical activity and could create new opportunities for implementing behavioural change in large numbers of inactive and underactive individuals because of its widespread use in less affluent and less healthy populations at high risk of inactivity.

Pratt and colleagues developed simulation models to project the probable effects of global megatrends (defined as major forces in societal development that are likely to shape people’€™s lives during the next 10 to 15 years) on the internet, mobile phones, and car ownership on levels of physical activity in countries of low, middle, and high income.

They estimated that the potential overall positive effect of the internet-based interventions on physical activity for middle-income countries to be double that of high-income (3,44 minutes vs 1,46 minutes per week), a finding attributable to middle-income countries accounting for a much greater proportion (71 percent) of the global population.

Because access to mobile phone technology is similar in countries of middle and high income, the potential effect weighted by income country population distribution of mobile phone interventions on physical activity are also estimated to be far greater in middle-income countries (7,91 minutes vs 2,27 minutes per week).

‘€œWith the high prevalence of both physical inactivity and the rapid growth of the mobile phone sector in low-income and middle-income countries, there is the potential for population-level effects that could truly affect global health,’€ says Pratt.

But he warns: ‘€œTechnology-based physical activity interventions and policies are unlikely to be optimised when 90 percent of the evidence and experience comes from high-income countries, while 84 percent of the world lives in the very different context of low-income and middle-income countries. If we are to truly take advantage of promising technologies and intervention strategies we must build the research and public health practice capacity required to effectively deploy and evaluate these strategies in low and middle income countries. This is a big challenge, but marked progress in countries such as Colombia and Brazil suggests that it is also an achievable challenge.’€

Sources: The Lancet