As a shift worker for most of my 40+ years in the workforce I can vouch for the nasty effects of sleep deprivation.Some occupations have to work shifts on a 24/7 basis.I don't know if there is any way around this.

Now retired and feeling a lot healthier for it.

I agree Andrew.

Sleep deprivation also plays a major part in m.v.a's [motor vehicle accidents]along with drowsiness if tired previously, after consuming heavy meals in some people during long distance travel.

Of the one accident I was involved in 11 years ago, sleep deprivation was the primary factor. I had sat up until 5am typing material for an urgent business issue, slept for 3 hours and departed the home at 8am. The sleep deprivation had been on-going for 18 months previously [worked 2 full-time jobs]to support the family.

Bang! My 4 year old son's side of the door hit by a lawyer's wife dressed in her country road gear. She continued driving her volvo, missing in action for 5 minutes [drove around the neighbouring streets], returned, muttered how tired she was, reeked of alcohol, wrote out her name and number, jumped into her volvo and departed with her four year old son [no injury to her son and no mark on her volvo].

My son was white in the face as he had suffered from the impact of the accident where the whopping hole in the door was left from 'the volvo driving lady'. My son recovered and from that day forward I knew not to place other lives at risk, my son's life included, driving when suffering from chronic sleep deprivation.

I'm not sure what the experiment in the article proves.

If you force people to stay awake for forty hours and then test them against "properly rested" folk, surely you already know the answers?

It would surely be more useful to test a bunch of eight-hours-a-nighters against a bunch of five-hours-a-nighters, and see whether the different sleep patterns make any discernible difference.

My guess is that different people need different amounts of sleep, and that an absolute number of hours tells us nothing of significance.

I do agree however that the idea that sleeping during the day is a weakness, and frowned upon by managers, is poorly thought through. Some people benefit greatly from a ten to fifteen minute "nap". Again, I suspect the need to do so is driven by the individual's metabolism.

And I'm not sure this claim was particularly well backed up with evidence.

"Rather than seeing sleep deprivation as a sign of toughness..."

Is that how we see it? Really?