Do you know if you are playing SN? Maybe you have a partner or family making amazing news, or maybe you’re sleepless night listening to someone else’s slap in nores. Nord is usually a sign of obstructive sleep apnea, the most common sleep-related breathing disorder that can affect 25 million American adults. It causes people to stop repeatedly and start breathing while sleeping, when the throat muscles relax and block the airway Mayo Clinic.
According to recent research: climate change, seemingly unrelated phenomena may worsen this potentially dangerous sleep disorder. One published in Natural Communications It was found that higher temperatures resulted in a 45% higher chance of having obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) on a given night.
“In general, we were surprised at the magnitude of the association between ambient temperature and OSA severity,” said the lead author. Bastien Lechat exist Institute of Health and Medicine, Flinders University In Australia Press release.
Not only does this have a health concern, but it can have economic impacts: OSA is associated with a significant decrease in workplace productivity and absenteeism, and it becomes more common as temperatures rise, which could cost the global economy $30 billion in productivity losses, with another $68 billion in welfare.
The researchers used the Food and Drug Administration cleared OSA monitor to analyze sleep data from 116,620 participants in 29 countries to establish a link between daily ambient temperature and nighttime OSA status.
“Higher diagnostic and treatment rates will help us manage and reduce adverse health and productivity issues caused by climate-related OSA,” co-author Danny Eckert said in a press release.
Obstructive sleep apnea and health losses from climate change
As OSA intensifies due to warming temperatures, this can lead to adverse health effects. Untreated or severe cases of OSA can increase the risk of dementia, Parkinson’s disease, hypertension, cardiovascular disease, anxiety and depression, and even Shorten your lifespan. OSA patients may also suffer from frequent fatigue and mood swings, which are caused by the continuous disruption of sleep during respiratory disruption that inhibit settlement into deep restorative sleep.
Bad sleep Also link to Faster brain agingdecreased cognitive function, mental health, inflammation, cardiovascular disease and inhibition of the deterioration of the immune system.
Higher ambient temperatures also Recognized negative impact About health, including Mental health deterioration Overall worsened Quality of sleep and duration. Previous research It is shown that higher temperatures generally expand the effects of OSA, as higher temperatures lead to lighter sleep phases and more frequent destruction and awakening.
The financial burden of OSA
In this study, researchers estimated that global warming in OSA prevalence in 2023 was associated with 788,198 loss of healthy age in 29 countries.
Given how OSA affects the mood and energy levels caused by sleep disruptions, people generally experience lower productivity and more frequent working hours. However, if the frequency and severity of OSA continue to increase, it could be catastrophic for the global economy. In 2023, researchers observed that the increase in OSA caused 25 million absenteeism days in 29 study countries, resulting in lost labor that caused $30 billion in economic costs.
The researchers warn that the study population may have underestimated the potential health and economic burden: All participants, who own sleep tracking devices and live in highly developed countries, have obtained larger cooling tools, such as air conditioners, which create the greatest underload of lower socioeconomic groups.
As the average global temperature is expected to increase by 2.1°C to 3.4°C, the effects of heat may worsen.
“Our findings highlight that the OSA burden is not taking greater policy actions to slow global warming due to rising temperatures, and the OSA burden may increase to 2100 years,” Lechat said.
“Looking forward, we want to design intervention studies to explore strategies to reduce the effects of ambient temperature on sleep apnea severity and to examine potential physiological mechanisms that link temperature fluctuations to OSA severity,” Eckert added.
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