New research into human sleep patterns has discovered that we spend one-third of our lives sleeping or attempting to sleep.
Considering most of us sleep in our snuggly beds, that means we spend a third of our life rolling around in our bedding and smooshing our faces into our pillows.
Why you need a top sheet on your bed
You might be forgiven for thinking that most people make their beds the same way. Alas, you would be wrong. There’s an emerging trend whereby people have stopped using the humble yet necessary top sheet. Instead, many people are opting to sleep between their fitted sheet and the duvet – sans top sheet.
But we are here to tell you that you should have a top sheet on your bed, and science supports our claim, regardless whether you find yourself tangled in it at 3am in the morning.
Studies have shown that on average, humans sweat around 87 litres of moisture per year, and at least a third of that is going straight into your sheets. The same study found that feather and synthetic pillows between one and a half and 20 years old contain four to 17 different types of fungus. And you certainly wouldn’t sleep on your pillow without a case, would you?
A breeding ground for germs
In an interview with Tech Insider, microbiologist and pathologist Ingrid Johnson said that your bed is an actual breeding ground for spores of fungi, bacteria, animal dander, pollen, soil, lint, finishing agents of whatever the sheets are made from, colouring material, and all sorts of excrement from the human body such as sweat, sputum, vaginal and anal excretions, urine milieu, skin cells – honestly, the list goes on. And without a top sheet, that excrement is soaking straight through your duvet cover, and into the body of the duvet.
Furthermore, most duvet covers are not made to be laundered every week, and even if you are washing your duvet cover every week – when was the last time you cleaned your duvet?
The ever-present duvet is a hotbed for dust mites and bacteria, not to mention the skin cells and sweat it collects from the human body every night.
Helen Johnson, the spokesperson for The Fine Bedding Company told the Huffington Post that a duvet that hasn’t been washed for a year is likely to be home to more than 20,000 dust mites, in addition to the copious amounts of organic body matter.
With that in mind, the humble top sheet is the last line of defence between you and all your germs, and the germs soaking into the core of your duvet. And even if you sleep with a top sheet, all bedding should be washed once a week – meaning if you don’t sleep with a top sheet – that duvet cover needs to be laundered more than once a week. Not such a low-maintenance option now, is it?
So, how do you feel about those top sheets now, huh?
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