Why Experts Say Permanent Daylight Saving Time is Unhealthy

The misalignment of our internal clocks and the sun could result in a handful of heath concerns, experts say.

Follow on social for more NOVA content!

[rachelrodgers]

Arizona and Hawaii keeps their clocks at same time all year around. I lived in Tucson for a while, and I was born and raised in California. I actually *LOVED* not having to flip my clock forward and back.

[robertmcmanus]

This is all due to a clock based culture that insists people get up at a certain time. If people lived more in sync with the rising and setting of the sun and weren't forced to get up at times they naturally wouldn't(which is evidenced by the need for alarms for most people)they'd be happier and healthier.

[Adamborries]

That's really interesting about the health effects of living on the western edge of a time zone. It's almost like we weren't designed to live by a clock. 🤔

[bankerdave]

Many places in the world do not have daylight saving time and they are all doing fine.

[bradliston]

Unless you move to the equator or get as close as you can to it, it's a fact of the world that you will have longer and shorter days during the year. A clock face doesn't make the sunlight last longer.

The unhealthy thing for me is changing my sleep schedule around once I get used to it. For seemingly no reason, I know the winter in my area will have shorter days and it doesn't matter what the clock says, the days won't get longer just because I move my clock forward or backwards.

[EattheApple]

Standard time, get rid of the fake day light savings time.

[lethaleefox]

I am retired, but decades of having to be at work in the dark in production industry that was not 9 to 5, but 5 to 2... still has waking up at 3 am too often. My inclination was more night owl than early bird. Done giving a poop about time except for movie show times and pills for heart condition. Not surprising that the experiment in timing control happened during my lifetime. Bright ideas from dim bulbs, maybe.

[lidar]

Daylight Savings Time is like cutting the top off a blanket and sewing it to the bottom, and then claiming that it's warmer that way.
The energy savings claimed by some is minimal at best. The effects on our health and safety are intentionally overlooked to justify being able to spend more time being able to play, party or otherwise participate in recreational activities.
Anyone who has children despises trying to get them to bed when the sun is still high enough in the sky that they don't understand, much less want to sleep then.
Seeing children standing out in the dark waiting for their school bus while they're half asleep in the dark is dangerous to both themselves and the drivers who are feeling the same way.
As you look at the history of Daylight Savings Time, you can see that its original purpose was to accommodate aristocratic desires for more functions in the evening. Farmers and workers still had to perform their work at the same times.
As many have said in the past, " Money talks!"

[JSchrumm]

Wow! How did the human race survive before the invention of the clock?

[Seawitch]

I live in Juneau Alaska and because of the darkness in the winter months which is hard enough. Then along comes daylight savings time making it much harder for everyone especially for the school kids.

[janisgallagher]

I agree. I live in the Boston area and I can never seem to adjust to DST. In the fall when we set the clocks back it's like my body gives a big sigh of relief.

[anarchistatheist]

While I agree with the idea of the united states senate passing the bill to keep the same time year round. It should be to go back an hour to permanent standard time year round. The only time clocks should go forward or backwards is if you go another time zone.

[lunarorbit]

I've been saying for years that we should change our clocks (either forward or back) one last time, but only by half an hour. That would split the difference and give us some of the benefits and some of the negatives of daylight savings all year round.

[johntracy]

No matter how much we fiddle with our clocks, it doesn't change the fact that daylight is shorter in December compared to June.

[keith]

The answer is simple. Turn the clocks back to standard time & leave them there. No more moving the clocks forward an hour. Why standard time you ask? Simple....because it is the CORRECT TIME.

[rocketmansdaughter]

If we had to pick just one option, why would 'Standard Time' not be the go-to option? Daylight Savings is a 'manufactured' concept, and I don't understand why it was chosen as the option for a 'permanent' time.

[stevewithaq]

Standard vs Daylight Savings is a red herring - those who will be positively affected by one will be negatively affected by the other and vice versa, and those cancel out.
The brief snippets provided in this video in no way provide evidentiary support one over the other - instead they appear to be deliberately cut to cherry-pick one side over the other.
The ideal is clearly to stop trying to force people to meet arbitrary time schedules that are out-of-sync with their environmental time.
Work and school should start a reasonable time after sunrise and end a reasonable time before sunset.
This is a societal problem, not a metric one.

[glennwebster]

The reason that it affects health is because you keep switching it back and forth. We adapt and adjust to our surroundings.

[chiba_disk]

Where were all these "going to work in the dark is unhealthy" people when I had to clock in a 4am?

[mls]

I’d prefer standard time, but I’ll take permanent daylight time over having to switch twice a year. As it is, we’re only going back to standard time for four months over the winter.