A study by the British Heart Foundation has shown that 1 in 3 school children do less than an hour of exercise a week. The study looked at the exercising patterns of children between the ages of 8 and 15 years of age and also undercovered that as little as 1 in 8 children are active for 60 minutes a day - the amount of activity suggested by the World Health Organisation to maintain good health.

The study into the activitiy levels of 1,029 school children only 78% of children knew how much daily exercise was recommended, whilst 30% of children couldn't be bothered to exercise and would rather play video games or interact on social networks sites like Bebo, Facebook, Myspace and Youtube.com. 

This information flies in the face of government guidelines which say that primary and secondary school children should have a minimum of 2 hours of school PE per week.

The British Heart Foundation (BHF) suggest that the UK is in danger of producing children that have blase attitute to exercise and health and that it is possible that the next generation of children could die earlier than their parents.

The BHF suggest that children should be encouraged to walk to school, run around at playtimes, interact with school sports and become more physically active at home, rather than just sitting in front of a computer or television.

Victoria Taylor, the British Heart Foundation senior dietician, said it was important to get into good habits early in life, as physical inactivity is one of the key risk factors for coronary heart disease and that being physically fit and active as an adult halved the risk of contracting coronary heart disease (CHD) and having a heart attack.