<div><p>TAIPEI (Reuters Life!) - More than one in five people in Taiwan suffers from insomnia likely caused by stress due to the economic woes, a figure higher than the global average, researchers said on Wednesday.</p><p>The survey of 4,005 people found that 21.8 percent of the population has chronic trouble falling asleep or staying asleep, said Lee Hsin-chien, psychiatry chairman at government-run Shuang-Ho Hospital in Taipei.</p><p>Overseas, averages of 10 to 15 percent of the population reports insomnia, he said, while Taiwan's rate was about 10 percent in 2000.</p><p>Stress due to recession on the export-reliant island earlier this year might have contributed to the increase, Lee said.</p><p>Diabetes, hypertension, anxiety and depression may also be driving insomnia as health generally declines in the face of an increasingly Western lifestyle, he added.</p><p>Earlier this year, Taiwan was the fourth Asian economy after Japan, Hong Kong and Singapore to enter recession in the face of the global financial crisis and a collapse in demand for the region's exports.</p><p>The state of the economy prompted employers to lay off workers or require unpaid leave.</p><p>"We expected the rate to be high but not that high," Lee said. "A lot of factors come into play. It's possibly stress, or it could be people's health quality."</p><p>Lee led the fourth survey commissioned by the Taiwan Society of Sleep Medicine, which was conducted via telephone in October. He said health professionals in Taiwan were considering a 2010 survey using written questionnaires to determine underlying causes the 2009 results.</p><p>(Reporting by Ralph Jennings, editing by Miral Fahmy)</p><img src="http://admatch-syndication.mochila.com/images/ad.gif?aid=65090638&bid=informcom" /></div><div id="copyright"><div>

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