Daylight saving time is ending Sunday â and the change can affect your health. How to prepare before the clocks ‘fall back.’
Daylight saving time will be coming to a close this weekend. The onset of daylight saving time in the spring is linked to more negative health consequences like a higher risk of obesity, metabolic syndrome, cardiovascular disease and depression. However, the clocks “falling back” in November are also associated with some adverse health outcomes such as disrupted sleep, more strokes and the incidence of car accidents going up. With daylight saving time happening Sunday, Nov. 3, here’s your guide to what to know including when DST is happening, a brief history, who doesn’t participate, how changing clocks impacts health and how to prepare.
When does daylight saving time start and end?
Daylight saving time ends at 2 a.m. local time on Sunday, Nov. 3, when we “fall back” and gain an extra hour of sleep. We’ll get an extra hour of daylight in the mornings but lose an hour of daylight in the evenings.
Daylight saving time will begin again next year on Sunday, March 9, 2025, when we “spring forward” and lose an hour of sleep. We’ll gain an extra hour of light in the evenings but have darker mornings.
A brief history of daylight saving time
Daylight saving time was introduced in the United States in 1918 as a way to conserve energy during World War I. However, studies have shown that it isn’t actually saving much energy.
Some have credited Founding Father Benjamin Franklin with originating the idea of a seasonal time change after he proposed regulating time in a satirical essay, but Philadelphia’s Franklin Institute has disputed this. Contrary to popular belief, farmers didn’t advocate for daylight saving time, either; in fact, agricultural groups called for a repeal of daylight saving time in 1919, saying that the biannual changes were disruptive to their workday. After the 1919 repeal, daylight saving time was still observed but at inconsistent times that varied across different regions.
