Sleep experts have warned against attempting a risky online challenge, after a 19-year-old Australian Youtuber known as “Norme” stayed awake for 265 hours straight for an online stunt.
The Youtuber live-streamed his attempt at spending the longest time awake, finally giving in to sleep on August 12 after 11 days with no shut-eye.
“I’m astounded that someone would willingly put themselves through such an ordeal because it is certainly not recommended from a health perspective,” The University of Melbourne’s Dr Vanessa Cropley said.
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”There are a lot of inherent risks to it, so it’s quite concerning that someone would actually do this, just for an experiment.”
The 19-year-old largely spent the almost two weeks wide awake in his home near Melbourne, as an audience of grimly-fascinated viewers watched on.
Norme, who asked for his name to be withheld, told 9News.com.au he began to grow drowsy after the first night without sleep.
By day 10, he said he was “pretty freaking delirious.”
He did not speak to any doctors before embarking on the challenge.
“I looked it up, it has a zero per cent mortality rate,” Norme said.
“Nobody has ever died from trying.”
The 19-year-old slipped into microsleep at various points during the ordeal but had helpers standing by to prod him awake.
He celebrated as he passed the 265-hour mark, claiming the dubious record, before falling asleep for 38 hours.
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The day after his recovery sleep, he told 9News.com.au he felt dizzy but otherwise OK.
Norme was aiming to surpass the record set by Randy Gardner, a US man who spent 264 hours awake when he was a teenager in 1964.
No official world record exists, with Guinness World Records having stopped their records for safety reasons.
Effects of extreme sleep-deprivation
A Research Fellow at the Melbourne Neuropsychiatry Centre, Dr. Vanessa Cropley said the effects of long-term sleep deprivation can be severe.
She said symptoms begin with sluggishness, drowiness and decreases in alertness.
Patients become irritable and lose focus, with progressive difficulties in their cognition.
“What’s more concerning is that there can be sometimes symptoms of kind of psychosis that is experienced,” she said.
“There have been cases where people do see things that aren’t there, or hear things that aren’t there, or have this kind of paranoid thinking.
“So that’s actually really concerning.”
On August 14, Norme posted a photo of his hands to X, mentioning that the skin on his hands had become irritated and was peeling.
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After spending so much time awake, Cropley said the Youtuber needed 38 hours of sleep for his body to recover from the stress, which may have caused the inflammation of the skin.
In the past, researchers studied the effects of long-term sleep deprivation in lab conditions.
Academic experiments into sleep deprivation are considered unethical today.
Cropley reiterated that she would not recommend anyone else attempt Norme’s feat.
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