Dr. Richard Stevens, UConn Health Center. Photo: Ryan Cassella Tools Email to a Friend Print Article Tag at del.icio.us

The health of night shift workers
WNPR's Where We Live

HARTFORD, CT (2007-11-30) Soon, the International Agency for Research of Cancer, a part of the World Health Organization, will release a study in the prestigious cancer journal The Lancet Oncology that says it now considers shift work to be a "probably human carcinogen." This puts overnight workers in the same category as those exposed to toxic chemicals like PCBs.

Researchers have been making these links for years, warning that the disruption of the body's natural cycle of light exposure can cause many harmful effects, including cancer. But there's more to it than that. Shift workers are often sleep-deprived, sometimes depressed, and eat unhealthy foods.

Today, we'll talk to one of the leading researchers in the field, Dr. Richard Stevens of the UConn Health Center. We'll look at how these findings might shake up the American workforce and prompt changes in the way we look at the problem of artificial light in our lives.

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