Weeks of disrupted sleep during the World Cup raise health concerns as obesity rates climb and experts warn against ignoring sleep debt.
FOR 39 days, Malaysia ran on borrowed sleep. The World Cup final between Argentina and Spain kicked off at 3am, marking the end of a tournament in which more than half of the most-watched group-stage matches were played between midnight and 5am.
Mamak stalls across the country were packed before kickoff. When Spain eventually lifted the trophy, millions of fans stayed awake to witness it. That is what makes the World Cup special – the shared excitement, the collective anticipation, the feeling of being part of something bigger.
It is also what makes it a quiet problem.
The morning after, one-day emergency leave requests tend to spike and offices run a little slower. This comes at a time when Malaysia is already facing a significant public health challenge: one of the highest obesity rates in South-East Asia. According to the 2023 National Health and Morbidity Survey, 54.4% of Malaysian adults are overweight or obese while 21.8% are clinically obese.
Weeks of disrupted sleep, however joyfully spent, do little to improve those numbers. A sleepless night quietly alters our appetite: leptin, the hormone that signals fullness, falls, while ghrelin, the hunger hormone, rises.
It is one reason why the post-match mamak run can feel less like a choice and more like a compulsion.
According to Prof Dr Ahmad Izuanuddin Ismail, president of the Sleep Disorder Society of Malaysia and vice-president of the College of Physicians Malaysia, staying up for World Cup matches may seem harmless, but even a single night of lost sleep can have measurable effects.
These include impaired attention, slower reaction times, poorer decision-making, mood changes, increased daytime sleepiness and a higher risk of accidents.
He added that sleep deprivation can also raise blood pressure, promote inflammation and impair glucose metabolism, resulting in a transient rise in cardiovascular risk, particularly among people with obesity, obstructive sleep apnoea, hypertension, diabetes or cardiovascular disease.
He added that while the excitement of a football match may last only a night, the effects of lost sleep can linger far longer.
Those consequences were the focus of the Sleep 2026 Malaysian Multidisciplinary Sleep Conference, jointly organised by the Sleep Disorder Society Malaysia and Universiti Malaya Medical Centre in Bangsar South under the theme, “Redefining Sleep Health in the Obesity Era”.
The conference brought together sleep specialists from across the region, including Prof Naricha Chirakalwasan, president of the Sleep Society of Thailand, who cautioned against the common belief that lost sleep can simply be repaid.
“You cannot undo one bad night by sleeping in the next day,” she said.
Restoring normal hormonal and circadian balance after sleep loss can take several weeks of consistent, adequate sleep, she explained, adding that regularity matters far more than trying to “catch up”.
Naricha said irregular sleep is also associated with poorer metabolic, cardiovascular and mental health.
The message is clear: one long lie-in will not undo a late night, and repeating the cycle over a six-week tournament comes at a cost.
It will not be the last test this year. The Premier League returns in 30 days, with La Liga close behind, giving Malaysians fresh reasons to stay up long before the World Cup returns in 2030. All the more reason to build healthy sleep habits now.
The solution is surprisingly simple. Instead of sleeping until midday, take a 20- to 30-minute nap the following afternoon to restore alertness without further disrupting your body clock. After the final whistle, resist the temptation to prolong the night with another round of mamak food or caffeine. Both make it harder for your body to return to its normal sleep rhythm.
A regular waking hour is one of the strongest cues for resetting the body’s internal clock. If the fatigue lingers well beyond match week or you regularly snore, wake up unrefreshed or constantly crave food, it may be time to have your sleep assessed rather than simply blaming football.
Football will always tempt Malaysians to trade sleep for a few hours of excitement. The least we can do is repay that sleep debt properly instead of carrying it into the next big match.
Dr Julius Goh Liang Chye is a consultant otorhinolaryngologist, head and neck and sleep surgeon at Universiti Malaya Medical Centre and executive committee member of the Sleep Disorder Society of Malaysia. Comments: [email protected]
