The loss of an hour of sleep in the night from Saturday to Sunday, as is the case every spring in Quebec, may seem trivial. Many university studies, however, report an increase in hospitalizations related to heart problems in the days following this time change, which would also lead to a temporary increase in road accidents and medical errors.
At 2 a.m. Sunday morning, it will actually be 3 a.m. for Quebecers and residents of most Canadian provinces. Bars will lose sixty minutes of operation this weekend, while millions of people across the country will lose an hour of sleep. However, they will gain an hour of daylight until next fall, since the sun will set later at the end of the day, around 7 p.m. in Montreal and neighboring regions, this Sunday.
This time change, in force in some 70 countries and which has its origins in the First World War, is however increasingly contested. The Yukon and certain regions of British Columbia have thus decided in recent years to keep the same time all year round, while Saskatchewan has never adhered to the principle of time change, which originally aimed to increase production in times of war.
Quebec, New Brunswick and Ontario have also expressed in recent years their interest in ending this tradition, which they have not yet done. Many countries have not adopted the time change. This is the case, among others, of China, India, Pakistan and Russia.
Documented impacts
Many university studies have also fed in recent years the growing opposition of experts, governments and organizations in the health sector to the change of time, which takes place twice a year in Quebec. , spring and fall.
A study cited in 2018 by the American Heart Association notably reports a 23% increase in hospital admissions in the United States for atrial fibrillation – irregular heart rhythms – between the Monday and Thursday following the change. hour in the spring, compared to the rest of the year during these same days of the week. A situation that could be related to the loss of one hour of sleep that occurs after this time change, since no notable increase in hospital admissions has been noted on the sidelines of the fall time change, when Americans gain 60 minutes of sleep.
“Restoring permanent standard time all year round is the best option for our health and well-being,” concluded psychologist and president of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine, Jennifer Martin, in a statement released on February 28.
The time change would also contribute to medical errors in hospitals in the United States, according to a study published in 2020 in the Journal of General Internal Medicine. Analyzing data compiled over an eight-year period, the four authors found that medical errors increased by an average of 18.7% within seven days of the spring time change and 4.9% fall, when we set our watches and clocks back an hour.
“Policy makers and health care organizations should assess the delayed start of shifts or other emergency measures” to limit the risk of medical errors being made during “the transition to daylight saving time in the spring,” suggest the authors of the study.
More road accidents
Another study conducted by four American university researchers and published in 2020 in the scientific journal Current Biology testifies to a 6% increase in fatal road accidents in the United States in the week following the transition to daylight saving time, commonly known as “summer time”. The authors of the study noted in particular that the reduced visibility in the morning, after this change of time, as well as the lack of sleep engendered by this transition, increase the risk of suffering a road accident.
The researchers thus concluded that 28 fatal accidents could be avoided each year if the tradition of changing the time in the United States was abolished. “Our results support the theory that the complete abolition of daylight saving time would improve public health and reduce geographic disparities in health,” the study concludes.
The next time change — backwards this time — will take place in Quebec on the night of November 4 to 5.