Brewed Fresh Daily

I probably can't convey the irony of reading this at 4:30AM during one of my well documented cases of insomnia:

Hansen is part of a giant and growing class: worn-out, dragged-out denizens of a sleep-robbed netherworld. More than 82 million Americans -- nearly 40% of the teen and adult population -- suffer from some form of insomnia, meaning they routinely have trouble falling asleep and staying asleep. Even for those who grapple with transient insomnia a few times a year, the bouts of sleepless nights are an ordeal, like a bad, recurring flu. On the other side of the empty bed are countless people who cheat on sleep so they can squeeze more hours out of the day. Only 32% get the recommended eight hours of shut-eye on weeknights, according to a 2002 poll by the National Sleep Foundation. They won't outgrow the problem, either. Studies show that as we age, the quality of our sleep deteriorates (table). And our wired, 24/7 society makes it worse, bombarding us with news of mad cow disease and other coming calamities while beckoning us late at night to finish our work online. While we've been busy burning the midnight oil, scientists have been amassing evidence that sleep deprivation is a hazardous state. Insomnia has been fingered as a major risk factor for depression, alcoholism, and obesity. Other ruinous effects may be on display right in your office. Surveys indicate that nearly half of all office workers sleep poorly at least a few times a week, and more than 65% confess that they have trouble concentrating after a sleepless night, according to the National Sleep Foundation. Now think about the people responsible for your safety. A huge proportion of pilots -- not to mention policemen and doctors -- admit to making errors in sleep-deprived states, according to Alertness Solutions, a consulting company in Cupertino, Calif. "It's not as if people are off their game by 1%," says Mark K. Rosekind, president of the company. "They're way off." What's more, all this tossing and turning is putting a damper on the economy. Sleep deprivation costs $45 billion a year in lost productivity, health-care bills, and expenses related to traffic accidents -- rivaling the impact of depression, say, or stroke.

Or obesity even. Does anyone still wonder why all the emphasis on healthy cities? What would the economic impact of fit, well rested people be? Considering stories like this one, Cleveland could be a much more creative place.