“My cell phone is my best friend. It’s my lifeline to the outside world.” said Carrie Underwood

       When was the last time you were told to read silently, and you opened your book, and your phone was “magically” there. Yeah, you pulled out your phone and got on snapchat or played some dumb game. But is all that time harmful to you? Did you know they even have vitamins for excessive phone use!

      The use of phones in school has grown to an excessive amount. it‘s practically impossible to not see a phone here in school. 73% of teens own a phone, with 64% starting in middle school. While many don’t see this as a problem, it can be in the long run. The group with the least amount of smartphones in general are boys aged 13-15, living in a rural area.

     One of the reasons phones can be dangerous are car wrecks. The annual death rate is 1.5 million deaths, that’s about 3,200 deaths a day. There are also 20-30 million people living on disability due to texting and driving. The age group affected most is young adults 19-21.

    A second lesser reason to reduce phone usage is the blue light rays that are constantly absorbed by your eyes. Short term effects include eye strain, headaches, and temporal blurry vision. More serious long term effects which vary from dosage, will lead to macular degeneration and other age related effects sped up by high amounts of blue light. Don’t fret yet though, you can still be saved. Any vitamins that contain 10 mg of lutein and zeaxanthin. Foods that contain lutein are spinach and kale, with 20 mg, while eggs and corn contain 0.5-1 mg of lutein per serving. Most phone companies also offer a blue-light filter for night use, and there are many apps out there that claim to reduce blue-light for older phones without this option.

Computers are a serious risk to as they can use the same amounts of blue light as a phone can. Office workers are the hardest hit by blue-light usage because their work typically consists of computer, phone, computer, phone, you get the point. While some companies will make changes afterwards, age-related macular degeneration is not covered by workers comp and you could be left with the bill. The best thing to do would be to alert your boss about possible solutions if you find that blue-light exposure last longer than three hours daily.

These are some of the ways that you can protect yourself from the potentially dangerous blue light rays present in most phone screens. So next time you think about getting on your phone, think about your health. A text isn’t more important than yours or someone else’s’ life. In case your wondering on authenticity, go to https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3708350/, http://asirt.org/initiatives/informing-road-users/road-safety-facts/road-crash-statistics.

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