Dear MEL Topic Readers,
How daylight saving time affects our health
Often known as summer time, daylight saving time (DST) is the practice
of advancing clocks during the summer months. DST is observed in most of
Europe, Canada, the USA, and Egypt in the Northern Hemisphere, and Chile, New
Zealand, and some parts of Australia in the Southern Hemisphere. Last Sunday, most
European countries ended their daylight saving time, and Canada and the USA
will end theirs on this coming Sunday, November 2. DST started in some
countries over a century ago during World War I to conserve energy by allowing
people to extend their use of natural light. However, this artificial time
change seems to disrupt the body’s circadian rhythm, which can lead
to sleep deprivation, decreased sleep quality, and negative effects on
mood, metabolism, and cardiovascular health, especially during the spring
forward transition, causing immediate sleep loss and increasing the risk of
health problems like heart attacks, strokes, and accidents. It is quite
surprising to find such profound effects of starting a day just an hour earlier
or later on our physical and mental health. If an hour is too much, can’t we
adjust the time a little by little each day by using our smartphones instead of
manually changing clocks for an hour a day, like people did a century ago?
Read the article and learn the impacts of daylight saving time.
