Scientists have discovered a revolutionary new treatment that makes you live longer. It enhances your memory, makes you more attractive. It keeps you slim and lowers food cravings. It protects you from cancer and dementia. It wards off colds and flu. It lowers your risk of heart attacks and stroke, not to mention diabetes. You’ll even feel happier, less depressed, and less anxious. Are you interested?
Despite the bad weather and flu viruses, books are being published and it is worth drawing attention to at least two that focus on sleep. Because these are also highlighted by the British Medical Journal, they are certainly worth noticing. Although both books confirm most known laws, they introduce a fundamentally new requirement based on many new findings. A healthy adult should sleep seven to nine hours. Until now, a period of five to nine hours had been considered normal, but neuroscientist Walker and psychologist Culpin(ová) both agree that this is insufficient.
Civilization has significantly shortened sleep time and taken away our natural darkness, which in today’s cultural world is polluted by light pollution, and before it, one is not protected even at home. About three years ago, researchers in the South American jungle came across a previously untouched culture. The government halted further expansion and sent scientists – anthropologists, doctors, psychologists, and others. They also found that the part of the population that lived in the discovered area, which had already been reached by electrical power, slept on average three-quarters of an hour less than the inhabitants of areas without electricity.
Mathew Walker is convinced that people affected by the current way of life are more often those who go to bed later (owls), than larks, because “midnight” has ceased to be the midpoint of the night for them and has become somewhere before it begins. He considers the risks brought by insufficient sleep to be as serious as the risks of smoking or alcoholism. In connection with a lack of sleep, one can include cardiovascular diseases, obesity, diabetes, deterioration of memory and cognitive functions, early dementia, premature ageing, and tumors/cancer.
Viki Culpin(ová) calculates the economic losses and claims that insufficient sleep reduces next-day performance by 32%. From this figure, she calculates that if all adults working in Great Britain slept properly 7/9 hours, the British economy would earn 38 billion pounds a year, which amounts to nearly 2% of GDP. In a short TED video on YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZVFT9Ukfh8), she demonstrates that sleep deprivation has a similarly destructive effect on a person’s abilities (driving, concentration, performance, managerial skills) as a half-liter of wine (which she pours at the beginning of the performance; she then reveals to the less sharp-minded that it was cider).
Let’s be honest that something like eighty percent of sleep disorders is caused by our bad habits and disorder in the daytime rhythm and evening ritual. This can be fixed by one’s own efforts. When? Well, of course, right away! Now! From today.
Author: MUDr. Radkin Honzák, CSc. Used literature:
Matthew Walker: Why We Sleep. Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreamsm, Scribner, New York, 2017
Vicki Cilpin: The Business of Sleep. Bloomsbury Business, oxford, London, 2017