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One in Ten Americans Are Chronically Sleep Deprived

Posted by Zonk on from the good-thing-no-one-reading-this-works-a-high-stress-job dept.

WirePosted writes "A CDC research study released this past week indicates that the physical and mental health of many Americans is being adversely affected by a lack of sleep. According to the study, a part of the organization's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, one in ten US citizens are consistently failing to get enough sleep every night. Almost 40% of the people surveyed didn't get enough sleep for more than a week every month. The article notes that this trend can have far-ranging implications for health beyond simple fatigue."

5 of 329 comments (clear)

  1. Stimuli by Ammin · · Score: 4, Insightful

    150 channels, billions of internet pages, consoles, text messages, MMOs. Gone are the days when there was nothing to watch at 11:00 but the local news, leaving sex and reading (both good for sleep) as one's final options for the night. TFA mentions shift work, which seems rather off the mark, as much "shift work" went overseas to China with our industrial base.

    Our sleep deprivation, I would hazard to guess, is mostly voluntary (or semi-voluntary.) And overall it's not such a bad thing -- our time is short, and who can blame us for resenting the hours lost to sleep?

    (And it's 5:00 a.m. and I really wish I could sleep. Stupid new Wii and its evil bowling . . . .)

    --
    Step out the front door like a ghost into the fog . . .
  2. Re:More than 7 hours needed? Slashdot editors? by oodaloop · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Wow, way to turn an article about sleep deprivation into a political diatribe. First of all, neither I nor any of my coworkers kill anyone. We are intelligence analysts, providing strategic guidance to GEN Petraeus. Second, I resent the implication that killing people leads to damaging a person mentally. Just because you disaprove of it doesn't mean it's on par with brain damage to those who choose to serve our country. Third, you obviously have NO concept of what is going in here so try to keep your uninformed opinions to yourself in the future.

    --
    Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
  3. Kids and trying to catch up, keep me awake by sckeener · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Staying awake with the kids is my number one issue....basically I have to stay awake longer than them and basically get up with them.

    Of course there are activities that I want to do that I can't when the kids are awake...so I end up staying awake longer just to do them....heck...last night I stayed up to watch the first volume of Death Note on DVD. I can't exactly let my 7 or 4 year olds see something that is rated for >=14yr olds.

    Wash, rise, repeat....= lack of sleep.

    --
    "Only one thing, is impossible for god: to find any sense in any copyright law on the planet." Mark Twain
  4. Re:Kids and trying to catch up, keep me awake by Ihlosi · · Score: 4, Insightful
    Staying awake with the kids is my number one issue....basically I have to stay awake longer than them and basically get up with them.

    This gets exacerbated if one of your kids is a real early bird (would like to get up at 5:30 am), and the other one is a night owl (goes to sleep at 11 pm, but wakes up at 9 am).

  5. which type of american? by soulprivate · · Score: 5, Insightful

    the article refers to *North*americans, *Central*americans or *South*americans? I am chilean (therefore, I *am* american) and we do not have the sleep problem over here.
    Yes, I RTFA, so be kind and note the sarcasm.