logoalt Hacker News

indecisive_useryesterday at 5:13 AM4 repliesview on HN

I think you're missing the parent's point.

Cities in northern Europe, like Stockholm and Oslo, already have sunrise times as late or later than Vancouver will have under permanent DST.

If the effects of shifting the clock an hour are as extreme as purported, then we should already see those negative health effects in populations that live their entire lives under those conditions, but we don't.


Replies

Fargrenyesterday at 11:43 AM

Do we know that we don't see adverse health effects on those populations? I couldn't find any studies on the subject. I think it would be very hard to measure, since you can't really compare without comparing populations of different countries, and at that point any effects can be attributed to a myriad of differences between countries.

chpatrickyesterday at 10:45 AM

Suicide rate is higher in northern countries.

throw0101cyesterday at 12:27 PM

> I think you're missing the parent's point.

I'm not missing the point: the various various folks who study sleep and chronobiology would have (I hope) reviewed all the literature, including studies that cover northern Europe, before coming to their all-year Standard Time conclusion.

A position paper from Society for Research on Biological Rhythms (SRBR) in Journal of Biological Rhythms cites Russian data for example:

> Borisenkov MF, Tserne TA, Panev AS, Kuznetsova ES, Petrova NB, Timonin VD, Kolomeichuk SN, Vinogradova IA, Kovyazina MS, Khokhlov NA, et al. (2017) Seven-year survey of sleep timing in Russian children and adolescents: chronic 1-h forward transition of social clock is associated with increased social jetlag and winter pattern of mood seasonality. Biol Rhythm Res 3–12.

* https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/07487304198541...

Last time I checked a map (parts/lots of) Russia is just as north as Finland, Sweden, and Norway, and still the Russian government decided to rollback all-year DST.

Perhaps the effects differ in magnitude depending on geographic region, but as a general rule all-year Standard Time appears to be the best policy for most people most of the time.

sampoyesterday at 2:02 PM

Here is a circadian rhythm and sleep scientist in Finland, arguing for permanent standard time.

https://blogi.thl.fi/kellojen-siirtaminen-pysyvasti-talviaik...