If You’ve Only Gotten This Much Sleep, Do NOT Get Behind the Wheel

Driver fatigue is responsible for 100,000 crashes a year. (Photo: Getty Images)

Drowsy driving is just as dangerous as driving drunk – and now a scientific consensus sets a minimum threshold for sleep if you’re going to even THINK about getting behind the wheel.

The National Sleep Foundation and other scientists say that drivers who got two hours of sleep, or less, in the last 24 hours should not drive.

“While individual sleep needs vary, and stimulants, like caffeine, may trick sleep-deprived people into feeling alert, the reality is that people are definitely impaired when they have obtained two hours of sleep or less per day,” Harvard professor and sleep expert Charles A. Czeisler, PhD, MD, FRCP, FAPS, the chairman of the National Sleep Foundation’s Drowsy Driving Consensus Workgroup, said in a statement. “Though many are impaired with more than twice as much sleep, at a minimum, our two-hour threshold should serve as a red flag warning for individuals and as a guide for public policy makers.”

Of course, it’s possible to feel sleepy — and not be fit to drive — even when you got more than two hours of sleep the night before; some research shows that those getting eight or more hours of sleep a night have a lower crash risk than those getting fewer than five hours, and even those getting six to seven hours a night. But the new consensus is meant to serve as a starting point for people to know when they definitely are too tired to drive.

Drowsy driving is extremely dangerous, with 100,000 crashes (including 1,550 deaths and 71,000 injuries) occurring because of driver fatigue every year, according to the National Sleep Foundation.

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