It’s almost unbelievable, but this colossal financial blow can be traced directly back to insufficient sleep. Yes, you read that correctly! Annually, inadequate sleep costs five OECD countries a staggering $680 billion in economic output.
Sleep is central to our lives. It is vital for our health and well-being, ensuring better immunity, brain functioning, and physical health. A well-rested individual makes better decisions, improves productivity, and contributes significantly to the economy.
Despite this, sleep health is seldom talked about. It rarely finds a place in the national public health discourse. Lack of sleep affects the physical, mental and emotional wellbeing of people. This in-turn affects their productivity, and soon enough, the economy.
Stress, poor sleep habits, and diet all play spoilsport, when it comes to uninterrupted sleep. Believe it or not, a factor that is silently altering our sleep cycle is climate change. Climate change is radically affecting our sleep.
Soaring temperatures, for instance, impact our sleep. This is because falling sleep is dependent on our being sensitive to temperature. Likewise, declining air quality due to variations in climate and pollution, causes sleep-related breathing problems. These events are enough to shorten our sleep time and lead to poorer sleep quality.
Episodes of disrupted sleep create a vicious cause-and-effect cycle. It is not good for our society and not good for the economy. This lack of sleep leads to loss in workplace productivity, health issues, absenteeism, etc. Sleep deprivation causes increased road accidents, and even leads to industrial mishaps and medical errors.
Apart from that, lack of sleep can be manifested in various health risks: stress, depression, heart disease, type 2 diabetes, etc. These factors translate into economic and societal losses for a country.
Sadly, these grave dangers of a sleep-deprived society are yet to hit the headlines. Not just sleep, climate change has affected our dream patterns also. Dreams are a reflection of our natural environment, and importantly, they are central to our health and well-being.
Positive dreams are known to uplift our moods, process and organize information, and create space for resolving issues. Knowingly or unknowingly, increasing reports of climatic disasters and climate news have disturbed our sleep patterns—and slowly poisoned our dreams.
This lack of sleep hinders the functioning of our sleep. This affects us in the midst of our everyday life. In short, a good night’s sleep is vital for human welfare, economy and society.
Across many countries of our world, long working hours and hustle culture are still worshipped and valued.
It is high time that we tune into the benefits of sleep. Everyone knows that combating climate change is the need of the hour. Can’t we make sleep/rest a part of the solution to it? This might sound strange, but it is important for our health.
Interestingly, studies have shown that a four-day workweek can reduce carbon emissions and improve an employee’s well-being also. Take an example: during a four-day work week the number of employees plying would be less, which can cut down emissions. However, this approach won’t always fetch the desired results.
Firstly, people’s perspective on utilising a free day matters. There is a chance that an employee might engage in carbon-intensive activities. One can’t simply stop an employee from engaging in such activity.
It is important therefore to sensitise people about the purpose and intention of such initiatives. Sadly, things are hellish for the people in the lower-strata. They have to toil through the extreme weather for a living. For them, sleep is one way for them to cope with it. Due to the lack of infrastructure, they are deprived of a good sleep. In short, they are trapped in a vicious cycle of deprivation.
Climate change and its aftermath is sapping-out our human energy in ways unknown. Sleep is one of the low-cost and effective ways to regain energy and vitality. Climate change has now badly disturbed it. Yet, we rarely talk about it.
Let us remember now that our sleep health plays a key role in achieving our dreams of combating climate change.
Featured Photo: For representation purpose only ! Photo source via Pexels
