The first-of-its-kind law, which requires public high schools to start at 8:30 am or later and middle schools to start at 8 am or later, will hopefully allow teens to get more sleep
Only 35 per cent of Americans sleep between seven and nine hours on average. Pixabay
With teenagers in the US facing a sleep loss epidemic, California has introduced a new law pushing back school start times. The first-of-its-kind law, which requires public high schools to start at 8:30 am or later and middle schools to start at 8 am or later, will hopefully allow teens to get more sleep.
The Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in 2018 declared sleep loss is a common problem in the country.
Let’s take a look at sleep loss, why it is considered an epidemic and what the law hopes to achieve:
What is sleep loss?
Sleep loss is a state caused by inadequate quantity and quality of sleep.
According to Vox, sleep loss can be a result of insomnia or sleep deprivation.
CDC recommends that teens ideally sleep for eight to 10 hours a day, while adults ought to sleep for seven or more hours per night.
The sleep loss epidemic
According to National Library of Medicine, 50 to 70 million Americans suffer from sleep loss and sleep disorders. Sleep loss often gets in the way of daily functioning and seriously affects health.
A CDC survey on sleep loss showed 50 million people reported problems concentrating during the day, while 24 million people said that it interfered with their driving abilities and 18 million people indicated that sleep loss influenced with their job performance.
The study highlighted that more than a third of American adults are not getting enough sleep on a regular basis.
Sleep loss can trigger many chronic diseases such type two diabetes, heart disease, obesity and even depression. A sleep deprived person is more prone to accidents as sleep loss can compromise motor abilities. In addition to this, staying awake for longer hours can lead a person to make frequent mistakes.
According to Vox, researchers from Columbia University say that teenagers are most likely to be affected by sleep deprivation. The research says that the share of American adolescents who sleep sufficiently has decreased over the years. Only 35 per cent of Americans sleep between seven and nine hours on average.
As per the International Classification of Sleep Disorders, most sleep disorders are the result of excessive daytime sleepiness, difficulty in initiating or maintaining sleep.
COVID-19 pandemic’s role in sleep loss
More than half of all Americans have had problems sleeping during the COVID-19 pandemic. According to a study by the American Academy of Sleep Medicine, around 56 per cent of adults confirmed that they were having falling asleep. The study revealed that most of the respondents belonged to the 35 to 44 age bracket who reported that they were suffering from ‘coronasomnia’.
Stress over work, worries about family members and the uncertainty that the virus posed culminated into sleepless nights for most people in the US.
Angela Drake, a clinical health professor at the University of California told BBC, “Your brain is conditioned. You’re always at your workplace and working and then at your home you’re relaxing. There’s a differentiation there. Now, we are all just at home all the time.”
The fact that the pandemic restricted movement as most people worked from home, people were getting less exercise and exposure to natural light, both of which contribute to good sleep.
What does the law exactly say and how will it help?
According to National Centre for Education Statistics, from 2017-18, the average start time for high schools in the US was 8 am. However, 42 per cent of these schools began their day before 8 am and 10 per cent started before 7:30 am.
The law stipulates that the State Department of Education post specified information on its website, including research on the impact of sleep deprivation on adolescents and the benefits of later school timings.
Since teens need more sleep than adults as they have a natural tendency to fall asleep later as well as wake up later due to a shift in circadian rhythms that occur during puberty, a shift of school timings would give them enough time to sleep.
It has been discovered that states that already have pushed back school start times have seen positive results. In Seattle, when school start time was shifted from 7:50 am to 8:45 am, students got 34 minutes of extra sleep, according to a report in The Atlantic.
New York and New Jersey are considering bringing a similar law.
With inputs from agencies
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