Sleep apnoea cases may double this century due to global warming, researchers warn

Warmer nights caused by climate crisis could do sleep apnea Much more common and more dangerous by the end of the century, revealed a new study.

The rise in temperatures should worsen obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) – a sleep disorder already affecting nearly a billion people worldwide and linked to heart disease,, dementia And premature death said researchers.

The study, led by researchers from Flinders University and published in Nature communicationsis the first to model how climate Change can intensify the severity and impact on the health of AOS.

“This study helps us to understand how environmental factors like the climate could affect health by examining whether ambient temperatures influence the gravity of the AOS,” said the main author, Dr. Bastien Lechat of the FHMRI sleep of Flinders University.

The researchers analyzed more than 58 million sleep data of more than 116,000 people in 29 countries, registered via a sub-sub-sensor which followed the respiratory disorders during sleep.

The data, collected over several years, were then paved with hourly climatic data from global climatic models to simulate the gravity changes of AOS in different warming scenarios.

“Overall, we were surprised by the magnitude of the association between the ambient temperature and the seriousness of the AOS,” said Dr. Lechat.

“Higher temperatures have been associated with a 45% increase in the probability of a sleeper under a given OSA.”

The study revealed that the increase linked to the temperature of the severity of the AOS was particularly pronounced in European countries compared to Australia or the WEThat researchers suggest can be linked to different access to air conditioning.

Researchers have used years of life adjusted in terms of disability (Dalys) to estimate health and sleep apnea exacerbated by the climate. They found that in 2023, the rise in temperatures was linked to the loss of around 800,000 years of healthy life in the 29 countries studied.

“This number is similar to other medical conditions, such as bipolar disorderParkinson’s disease or chronic kidney disease, “said Dr. Lechat.

The estimated total economic loss was around $ 98 billion, with $ 68 billion assigned to the loss of well-being and $ 30 billion to reduce the productivity of the workplace.

The principal researcher, Professor Danny Eckert, said that the sample could underestimate the real burden of AOS in low-income countries, as the data comes mainly from individuals in high income regions with better access to cooling and health care.

“This can biased our estimates and leads to an underestimation of the true cost of health and the economy,” he said.

In Australia alone, the cost of health problems related to sleep, including AOS, was previously estimated at $ 66 billion in per year.

The team now plans to study potential interventions, including the way access to cooling or behavioral adaptations could reduce the severity of sleep apnea in warming conditions.

“In the future, we want to design intervention studies that explore strategies to reduce the impact of ambient temperatures on the severity of sleep apnea as well as to study the underlying physiological mechanisms,” said Professor Eckert.

Without stronger global climate action, the burden of sleep apnea should increase sharply, warns the study, exacerbating the challenges of public health and the maintenance economies.