Insufficient sleep common among US adults

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) released a report revealing that about one-third of adults in the US appear to be getting insufficient sleep. 

After surveying 444,306 US adults in 2014, CDC found that while two-thirds of white people nationally got enough sleep, only about half of blacks, Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders did. 

Among the respondents, 11.8% reported a sleep duration of 5 hours or less, 23.0% reported 6 hours, 29.5% reported 7 hours, 27.7% reported 8 hours, 4.4% reported 9 hours, and 3.6% reported 10 hours or more.

Overall, 65.2% reported the recommended healthy sleep duration of 7 hours.  The age-specific prevalence of sleeping ≥7 hours was highest among respondents aged ≥65 years (73.7%).  The prevalence of healthy sleep duration was highest among respondents with a college degree or higher (71.5%). The prevalence was higher among married respondents (67.4%) compared with those who were divorced, widowed, or separated (55.7%), or never married (62.3%).

Healthy sleep duration ranged from 71.6% in South Dakota, which has the largest proportion of residents who get at least seven hours of sleep each night, to 56.1% of Hawaii that has the lowest proportion. A lower prevalence of healthy sleep duration was observed in the southeastern United States and in states along the Appalachian Mountains.

       

CDC’s report states that sleeping less than seven hours per night is associated with increased risk for obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure, coronary heart disease, stroke, frequent mental distress, and all-cause mortality.

As more than one third of U.S. respondents, or approximately 84 million U.S adults reported sleeping less than 7 hours in a 24-hour period.  The need for public awareness and public education about sleep health is urgently needed.  In addition worksite shift policies that ensure healthy sleep duration for shift workers, particularly medical professionals, emergency response personnel, and transportation industry personnel should be implemented.