1 in 3 Americans Aren't Getting Enough Sleep

Generally speaking, Americans appear to be a tired bunch. A new CDC analysis finds that nearly one in three US adults (30.5%) falls short of the recommended seven hours of sleep a night, and only a bit more than half (54.8%) say they feel rested most mornings, reports Scientific American. Some highlights of the report, drawn from the National Health Interview Survey:

• Overall, 15.4% had trouble falling asleep, and 18.1% had trouble staying asleep. The difficulty in falling asleep decreased with age, from 18.3% among adults ages 18-34 to 12.8% among adults 65 and older.
• Men and women log similar sleep times, but men are more likely to feel rested, while women report more trouble nodding off (19% versus 12%).

• Roughly 64% of those 65 and up say they generally wake up well-rested, the highest percentage among age groups. Faring the worst were 35- to 49-year-olds at 50.1%.
• About 40% of Black adults report getting too little sleep and are less likely to feel rested than white, Asian, or Hispanic adults.
• Asian adults were most likely to say they wake up refreshed, at about 62%.
• "Our need for sleep parallels our need for air and water," Michael Grandner of the University of Arizona College of Medicine, who was not involved in the research, tells MedPage Today. "Yet, our society still often sees sleep as unproductive."