When government-mandated phasing out incandescent lighting for energy efficient LEDs (light-emitting diodes), they didn't tell us the effect on our health.
Alexander Wunsch, a physician and lecturer at Wismar University in Germany says "blue light, isolated from all the other colors on the light spectrum, is damaging our retinas and disrupting our endocrine systems, resulting in all sorts of physical and mental illness." Whereas, "natural light gives off all the colors (wavelengths) of the rainbow in a somewhat continuous manner,"
A Harvard Medical School article "linked working the night shift and exposure to light at night to several types of cancer (including breast and prostate), diabetes, heart disease, and obesity".
Many optometrists predict 100,000 Americans will become legally blind due to blue-light damage over the next decade.
We are exposed to LED lighting at school, work, stores, iPads, large LCD television sets.
Texas Optometrist Dr. Albert Pang said brief periods of exposure to blue light in this range can damage the retinal pigment epithelium. Damaged RPE eventually leads to photoreceptor cell death. If enough photoreceptor cells die, total blindness can occur.
He said switch to incandescent (which government phased out) or halogen lighting to reduce the amount of blue lighting we get.
"Get some filter on your glasses to screen out the blue light. For patients that do a lot of computer work, to use some kind of protection, such as a computer lenses with a light yellow tinge or a blue reflector," said Pang.
He warned that children under 10, are especially at risk...and parents shouldn't let them use electronic devices for too long.
"The pupil tend to be larger, so we need to be very careful. I know we tend to give them the electronic devices at a younger and younger age to look at now," said Pang.
And, all of our pupils are larger at night.
If you must be exposed to blue light after dark, definitely wear blue-light blocking glasses. Some cell phones have an option to make the screen more of a yellow tint.
In addition to damaging our eyesight, blue light after sunset disrupts our endocrine system.
LEDs are the most dangerous at night, because we cannot get any red light. Being in darkness after sunset is optimal, followed by candle light, otherwise, try to find incandescent bulbs.
If you must be exposed to blue light after dark, definitely wear blue-light blocking glasses.