Image source: Deutsche Welle
Sleep plays an integral role in health. A good night's sleep rejuvenates your body and leaves you awake refreshed and ready for the day. To restore the brain and physical health to its best, everyone must get enough sleep. However, in the high-paced, high-competition modern society, sleep seems to have become a luxury. Lack of sleep has become a global epidemic. 30-40% of people worldwide have sleep problems.
In China, more than 300 million people have sleep disorders, and the incidence of insomnia in adults is as high as 38.2%, of which the proportion of insomnia in young people is even higher. More than 60% of young people born after 1990 feel that they do not sleep enough, and more than 60% of adolescents and children sleep less than 8 hours.
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Many people are dusty, have trouble sleeping, and don't get the rest they need. Lack of sleep and poor sleep quality can be caused by a variety of factors, including sleep disturbances, medical conditions, and mental health. Sleep problems affect people of all ages, and their effects can be far-reaching.
According to international studies on sleep, a person will experience four to six sleep cycles (stages) during normal sleep time. On average, we spend about two hours a night dreaming. The key driver of the body's circadian rhythm, or internal clock, is the superior optic nucleus (SCN) in the brain, which consists of about 20,000 neurons. While sleeping, a person's body temperature drops by one to two degrees Fahrenheit. The rate of metabolism decreases by about 15%.
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Adults between the ages of 18 and 64 need seven to nine hours of sleep per night. It takes 7-8 hours for adults over the age of 65.
However, many people do not reach this normal sleep time. For example, 35.2% of adults in the United States sleep less than 7 hours per night on average. In Hawaii, adults sleep up to 7 hours per night at the highest rate of 43 percent. Detroit, Michigan, an economically backward and decaying city, has a higher rate of sleep deprivation, with 49.8 percent of adults lacking sleep time. Almost half of Americans say they feel tired and sleepy during the day 3 to 7 days a week. Black adults are almost twice as likely to sleep as whites compared to whites.
42.6% of single parents slept less than 7 hours per night, compared to 32.7% for adults in two-parent households and 31% for adults without children.
In production-focused industries, the average worker, more than 44 percent of workers, such as factory workers and plant operators, report sleeping no more than 7 hours a night.
Image source: Kavanle Hospital
Worryingly, Chinese sleep less than in the United States. According to the "2021 White Paper on Exercise and Sleep" jointly released by the Chinese Sleep Research Association and other institutions, more than 300 million people in China have sleep disorders. About 38% of Chinese adults suffer from insomnia; according to the World Health Organization, 27% of people worldwide have sleep quality problems. The proportion of people with sleep disorders in China is 11% higher than the world average.
In 2020 Chinese the average sleep duration was only 6.69 hours, which was lower than the minimum 7 hours required for sleep. That is, on average, Chinese 100% sleep time. Compared to 2013, the average sleep time is reduced by as much as 2 hours. The severity of the problem can be seen. Among them, takeaway riders, couriers, medical staff, Taobao shop owners and self-media practitioners sleep for an average of only 3 to 6 hours per night, and falling asleep after midnight is a common phenomenon. The average deep sleep per night is only 1.79 hours. Among them, 58.5% of Chinese think that they sleep shallowly and deep sleep is far from the standard. First-tier cities such as Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen are under more pressure, and young people sleep the least.
More and more young people are suffering from insomnia, and people are spending more and more time online. Internet access per capita is 27.6 hours per week. The scale of China's mobile phone users is as high as 900 million. What's more, some people spend more time online than they sleep each week.
The lack of sleep among primary and secondary school students has been a concern for many years, but it has not been significantly alleviated. Depending on the need for health, the younger the person, the more sleep time they need. For example, newborn babies need 14-17 hours of sleep a day. Kindergarten children aged 3-5 need 10-13 hours of sleep per day. Elementary school students aged 6-13 need 9-11 hours of sleep per day.
Sleep time required for different ages Image source: Sleep Consultant
However, in the last 10-20 years, the problem of sleep deprivation among Chinese students has intensified. According to the "Report on the Development of China's National Mental Health (2019-2020)", the phenomenon of sleep deprivation among adolescents is becoming more and more serious, and as many as 95.5% of primary school students, 90.8% of junior high school students and 84.1% of high school students have serious sleep time, which seriously affects the students' peace of mind and health. As a result, some students are listless even in class. The problem of sleep deprivation for all has reached a point where it cannot be ignored.
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