United States: We all have experienced it: the sticky, hot night when we just cannot fall asleep, feeling like we are tossing and turning all over the bed.
No one can sleep well during a hot weather. The disturbances are increasing, particularly among people with sleep apnea, as the heat levels soar both during day and night around the world due to the warming climate.
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In a new study in the journal Nature Communications, the likelihood of developing any type of sleep apnea issue overnight was nearly 50 percent higher at 80 degrees Fahrenheit or above than at temperatures in the 50s.
In extreme cases that are as bad as the people cease to breathe after 30 breaths in an hour also increases.
During sleep apnea, human beings cease and resume breathing during rest.
😴 Hotter nights aren’t just uncomfortable—they're dangerous.
— SRIRAM's IAS (@sriramsrirangm) June 18, 2025
A global study finds a 45% rise in sleep apnoea risk on hotter days.
🫡If warming continues, cases could double by 2100.
Climate change is stealing our sleep 🛌
📊 Infographic below. #ClimateHealth #SleepCrisis… pic.twitter.com/fU5rRaEsbB
According to Bastien Lechat, who is a sleep expert at Flinders University in Australia and the lead author of the new study, “You also increase the likelihood of having severe sleep apnea by 40%,” NPR News reported.
“It’s a striking number,” he noted.
The condition prevents the people’s body systems from having sufficient oxygen and interferes with sleep.
According to Lechat, the number of people with sleep apnea in the world is estimated at one billion with an underdiagnosis.
The effects of all this interrupted sleep are enormous. It affects the mood of people and their working capacities, and it also leads to numerous other health issues, including heart attacks and strokes, among others, due to sleep loss.
Moreover, as per Sara Mednick, a sleep expert and neuroscientist at the University of California, “We all know what it means to have a bad night of sleep,” NPR News reported.
“It’s a whole global problem that we need to really think about,” she added.
In many northern countries, such as Europe and Russia, the threat of a life-threatening event of sleep apnea almost doubled when it was very hot outside.
It increased by approximately 40 percent in such countries as the US.