Housework is good for you.

According to a new Australian-Chinese study, dusting and vacuuming could help prevent ovarian cancer.

The study, published in the International Journal of Cancer this week, found moderate exercise such as housework decreased the risk of ovarian cancer with the benefits increasing the harder the work.

Head researcher Colin Binns from Perth's Curtin University on Australia's west coast said the two-year study of 900 Chinese women found the risk of ovarian cancer declined with increasing physical activity. Housework was on the list.

"If you are only doing the housework 20 minutes a week ... it does not really count, but if you are doing three to four hours a day, this is fairly vigorous exercise and increases protection from ovarian cancer," Binns told the news agency.

The study was carried out at Xhejiang University Hospital in Hangzhou in Xhejiang Province just south of Shanghai.

Binns said the study backed the previously disputed idea that exercise helped stave off ovarian cancer and, possibly, other hormone-related female cancers such as of the cervix and uterus.

He said the reason was unknown

but suggested it could be because exercise prevented excess fat storage, which influenced hormonal activity. The immune system may also be enhanced through exercise, he said.