Most Sleepy, Best Rested States

Oct. 29, 2009 -- Who are the sleepiest Americans?

The results of a 2008 CDC poll are in. The dubious honor goes to West Virginia, where nearly one in five residents report never getting enough rest or sleep in the past month.

Overall, people living in the Southeastern states were most likely to say they get too little sleep.

On the other hand, the best rested Americans live on island territories and the state of Hawaii. Residents of Puerto Rico, Guam, Hawaii, and the U.S. Virgin Islands are most likely to say they got plenty of sleep or rest in the past month.

Although geography played a role, so did other factors.

• Too little sleep or rest every day in the past month was more commonly reported by:
• People aged 25 to 34 (13.8%) vs. people aged 65 or older (7.4%)
• Non-Hispanic blacks (13.3%) vs. non-Hispanic whites (11.2%)
• Women (12.4%) vs. men (9.9%)
• People with less than a high school education (14.3%) vs. people with some college education (9.6%)
• Divorced, widowed, or separated people (16%) vs. married people (11.1%) or unmarried people living together (12.1%)
• People unable to work (25.8%) vs. employed people (9.9%) or even unemployed people (13.9%)

The CDC poll was part of the huge Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System. In 2008, a national sample of 403,981 U.S. residents were asked, "During the past 30 days, for about how many days have you felt you did not get enough rest or sleep?"

Here are the state-by-state results. Rankings were added by WebMD; the CDC does not rank states. The data appear in the Oct. 30 issue of the CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.

This list ranks the states from most sleepy to least sleepy: