7 Hours Of Sleep May Be Optimal For Health

According to a study to investigate sleep patterns by Professor Franco Cappuccio, holder of the endowed Cephalon Chair in Cardiovascular Medicine and Epidemiology at Warwick Medical School in collaboration with with researchers at University College London 7 hours of sleep may be optimal for health.
Consistently sleeping less could have a detrimental effect on your health but apparently too much sleep may be as bad for us as too little.

A lack of sleep more than double the risk of death from cardiovascular disease, but too much sleep can also be linked to higher death rates.

They found those who had cut their sleeping from seven hours to five hours or less, faced a 1.7 fold increased risk of death from all causes, and twice the increased risk of death from a cardiovascular problem in particular.

To quote Dr Cappuccio and his co-author Dr Michelle Miller :

There is an expectation in today's society to fit more into our lives. The whole work/life balance struggle is causing too many of us to trade in precious sleeping time to ensure we complete all the jobs we believe are expected of us.
Chronic short sleep produces hormones and chemicals in the body which increase the risk of developing heart disease and strokes, and other conditions like high blood pressure and cholesterol, diabetes and obesity.
Sleep represents the daily process of physiological restitution and recovery, and lack of sleep has far-reaching effects.

I always thought that 8 hours of sleep was optimal, but apparently not so...

Not getting enough sleep is linked to obesity.

Not getting enough sleep is linked to obesity. A new study by Francesco P. Cappuccio, MD, of Warwick Medical School in the United Kingdom attempted to quantify the cross-sectional relationship between duration of sleep and obesity in both adults and children.

Taking a cross section of the studies done around the world, they found that there was a consistent increased risk of obesity among short sleepers.

This study is important as it confirms that the association between sleep and obesity is strong, and might be of public health relevance.
But it doesn't answer the question yet of whether it's the obesity that is the cause of the short sleep duration, or whether the short duration of sleep is causing obesity.
More studies are neede to answer that question..

And by the way, the recommended nightly sleep for adults is 7-8 hours.