A study by the University of Sydney in Australia could give people another reason to get active, after it found that physical exercise may radically offset the harmful effects of drinking alcohol.

A team of researchers at the university drew on responses from eight health surveys carried out in the UK between 1994 and 2006.

The findings suggest that people who drink alcohol but are physically active – achieving the minimum recommendation of 150 minutes of moderate-intensity activities a week – are less likely to die from cancer and other ailments associated with their alcohol consumption.

The first-of-its-kind study, published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine this week, notes that even moderate drinkers – those adhering to the UK health officials’ recommendations of no more than 14 units a week – face a 36 per cent greater risk of death from cancer as well as a 13 per cent greater risk of death from any cause.

That risk was substantially lessened or offset, however, among the drinkers who were physically active at the basic recommended level – or at the upper recommended level, equivalent to at least 300 minutes of moderate intensity activity per week.

“Our research suggests that physical activity has substantial health benefits even in the presence of potentially unhealthy behaviours such as drinking alcohol,” said senior author, associate professor Emmanuel Stamatakis, from the University of Sydney.

“Among physically inactive people, we saw that the risk for cancer and all-cause mortality was higher even at relatively low levels of drinking.

“We also noticed a dose-response relationship between drinking alcohol and cancer deaths, that is the risk of cancer deaths increased as alcohol consumption increased. But this was not the case among physically active people.”

He added that In the physically active groups, only harmful levels of drinking were associated with increased risk of cancer death and death from any cause.

To read the full study, click here for the British Journal of Sports Medicine.