Millions of adults are short of sleep either because of their work or habit of sleeping late and they accumulate sleep debts like gamblers racking up IOUs. Most people know that lack of sleep makes them punchy and lousy but they are unaware of the risks to their health. New research shows that sleep may be the third essential component of a long and healthy life besides good diet and exercise. Society is being victimized by not getting enough sleep. Our society, our safety, our health are at risk.

The sleep deprived people are cutting short a natural rhythm that begins in the evening when our inner clocks signal that it is bedtime. As the head hits the pillow, breathing slows and the brain relaxes, the rapid beta waves of the daytime will change to slower alpha waves of the night. Then alpha waves disappear, replaced by the even slower theta waves of stage-one sleep. The deep sleep stage is known as the lazy delta waves. In the absence of lights, the natural length for best effect is about eight hours.

Researchers are beginning to understand what we lose by giving up sleep. What happens to people who shortchange their sleep? In 1999, a sleep researcher at the University of Chicago; published a groundbreaking study in The Lancet in which, for six nights, young men spent only four hours in bed. During that week, their blood samples showed impaired glucose tolerance: they were in a pre-diabetic state.

The expert believes that sleep loss is partly involved in the rising rate of obesity. Lack of sleep could drive down growth hormone which controls the body