A Wash U Professor Explains Why Daylight Saving Time Is Bad For Us [View all]
This weekend, weary Halloween revelers across the U.S. will dutifully set their clocks to “fall back” — signaling the end of daylight saving time for 2020. The annual ritual may give some people an extra hour of sleep on Saturday night, but for others, including parents of young children and shift workers, it’s an annoying complication that takes days of adjustment.
And is it really necessary? A growing body of evidence suggests that our twice-yearly tradition of changing our clocks to gain or lose an hour of morning sunlight isn’t just irritating: It’s actually dangerous. In the first days after the switch to daylight saving time in the spring, heart attacks and traffic accidents both increase.
Several states are now contemplating an end to daylight saving time. Last year, the Illinois Senate actually passed a bill to abolish the practice, which dates back to World War I and was presented as an energy saver (research, it’s worth noting, is “decidedly mixed”).
On Thursday’s St. Louis on the Air, Erik Herzog explained why scientists increasingly believe we need to scrap the time shifting. A professor of biology and neuroscience at Washington University, he focuses on understanding circadian clocks and their role in behavior and health.
https://news.stlpublicradio.org/show/st-louis-on-the-air/2020-10-27/thursday-the-case-against-daylight-saving-time
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