Daylight saving time: 2 senators push to skip falling back this year

Two senators from Florida are pushing to have the U.S. set daylight saving time all year long.

Sen. Marco Rubio and Sen. Rick Scott have introduced a bill to not fall back when daylight saving time comes to an end in November, The South Florida Sun-Sentinel reported.

We are scheduled to reset our clocks, gaining back the hour we lost in March, on Nov. 1 at 2 a.m.

The two Republican senators said in a news release they want to see the time change not to happen.

The change would bring “one year of stability for families who are already dealing with enough change with virtual learning, work from home, and other disruptions the COVID-19 pandemic has placed into our daily lives," Rubio and Scott wrote, according to the Sun-Sentinel.

Scott has already tried to change to a single time year-round, doing away entirely with daylight saving time.

He signed legislation when he was governor of Florida to put the state on year-round daylight saving time, but the law did not get the required congressional approval to institute the law, the newspaper reported.

Rubio is looking to bypass the Senate Commerce Committee and introduce the measure on the Senate Calendar.

The move to do away with daylight saving time would apparently be backed by sleep experts.

Last month, the American Academy of Sleep Medicine said it should be canceled for everyone because of the effects of the time change on sleep patterns.

“We’ve had evidence slowly building up over the years, in terms of the adverse effects when we moved from daylight saving time to standard time, and vice versa,” AASM President Dr. Kannan Ramar said, according to CNN.

Some of the side effects Ramar said doctors see include impacts on cardiovascular health, stroke, medication errors, mental health and traffic accidents.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said one in three Americans don’t regularly get enough sleep, CNN reported. It’s been declared a public health epidemic.

Cox Media Group