Save your heart
21-09-2012
There are some incredibly stubborn and hard to defeat myths and old wives tales that seem to be unkillable despite the fact that they are not true. One of the most powerful of these is that humans should sleep for exactly 8 hours a night, that 8 hours is the best amount of time to sleep.
This belief has been put to rest (excuse the pun) definitively by a massive study of literally hundreds of thousands of people. The study showed that people who slept for 8 hours or more were more likely to suffer serious problems like cardiovascular disease. The results were adjusted so that the only difference was length of sleep, meaning that physical activity, family history, race, age, gender and any other factor have been ruled out.
The researchers found that those who slept for 8 hours or more were not suffering from more cardiovascular diseases but those who sleep for 8 hours are more likely to die young than those who sleep for between 6 and 7 hours. In fact, 6-7 hours is the optimal length of sleep, with 7 being the best.
If you sleep for 8 hours a day or more you are more likely to suffer from cardiovascular diseases and you are more likely to die young, so wake up!
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