SLEEP apnoea will become more common and more severe due to global warming, leading to increased health and economic burdens across the globe, Australian-led research published in Nature Communications suggests.

Rising temperatures increase the severity of obstructive sleep apnoea (OSA), and under the most likely climate change scenarios, the societal burden of OSA is expected to double in most countries over the next 75 years, it said.

Lead author and sleep expert Dr Bastien Lechat, from Flinders University, said this is the first study of its kind to outline how global warming is expected to affect breathing during sleep and impact the world’s health, wellbeing and economy.

“This study helps us to understand how environmental factors like climate might affect health by investigating whether ambient temperatures influence the severity of OSA,” said Dr Lechat.

“Overall, we were surprised by the magnitude of the association between ambient temperature and OSA severity.

“Higher temperatures were associated with a 45% increased likelihood of a sleeper experiencing OSA on a given night.”

The findings varied by region, with people in European countries seeing higher rates of OSA when temperatures rise than those in Australia and the US, likely due to different rates of air conditioning usage, the researchers reported.

And given that the research skewed towards high socio-economic countries and individuals, who may have more comfortable sleeping conditions, the results may underestimate the impacts of rising temperatures.

The study analysed sleep data from over 116,000 people globally using an under-mattress sensor to estimate the severity of OSA.

For each user, the sensor recorded around 500 separate nights of data.

The researchers then matched this sleep data with detailed 24-hour temperature information sourced from climate models.

“Using our modelling, we can estimate how burdensome the increase in OSA prevalence due to rising temperature is to society in terms of wellbeing and economic loss,” said Dr Lechat.

“The increase in OSA prevalence in 2023 due to global warming was associated with a loss of about 800,000 healthy life years across the 29 countries studied.

“This number is similar to other medical conditions, such as bipolar disorder, Parkinson’s disease or chronic kidney diseases.”

Senior researcher on the paper, Professor Danny Eckert, said that in addition to providing further evidence of the major threat of climate change to human health and wellbeing, the study highlights the importance of developing effective interventions to diagnose and manage OSA.

Read the paper HERE. KB

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