
LED light can damage eyes, French health authority warns - Vaslo
https://news.yahoo.com/led-light-damage-eyes-health-authority-warns-002221659.html
======
herf
f.lux author here. I'm pasting parts of the 458 page PDF into Google
Translate.

The recommendations look very good, and don't particularly match the Yahoo
article.

1\. They recommend IEEE 1789 as a flicker standard for Europe, which is
fantastic, as it covers lower levels of stroboscopic flicker that other
standards have missed. (e.g., typical 120Hz flicker from direct-wire TLEDs)

2\. They re-state the "acute" hazard from extremely bright LEDs, while urging
some caution on "chronic exposure" to lower light levels. Suggest that some
automotive lights could be a problem since they have high luminance. Urge more
research on progression of macular degeneration and chronic exposure. The
question about acute levels refers to a paper by Hunter [2012]. Nobody is
saying that screens or residential lights pose a new problem.

3\. Circadian recommendations are solid - more light during the day, and
reduce light around 480nm at night. Pregnant women and children may have lower
thresholds.

4\. Say most ophthalmic lenses filtering blue light don't do very much, and
specialized ones (you'd say very orange or red) are required for circadian
effects.

~~~
hnick
When I changed ISPs I also changed my modem, which is in the closet in our
master bedroom. It's brighter than a disco so I bought some light dimmer
stickers. It's still too bright so once I remember where I put them, I'm going
to add another layer. It's ridiculous. The only upside is that they are green
instead of blue, thankfully.

~~~
knodi123
interestingly, the human eye is most sensitive to green light, in the sense of
perceived-brightness-per-lumen.

~~~
londons_explore
Notably, while green LED's exist, we haven't yet managed to make an
_efficient_ green LED.

If we had, then illuminating streets etc. with green LED's would save a _lot_
of electricity for the same perceived brightness.

~~~
eveningcoffee
It is good then that we have not. Green light is the most ugliest kind in my
opinion.

------
DoctorOW
> The report distinguished between acute exposure of high-intensity LED light,
> and "chronic exposure" to lower intensity sources.

I can't say I'm convinced that LEDs are a hazard. This study doesn't really
say anything new. Cooler/brighter lights are more similar to daylight. Staring
into the sun is bad for you, emulating sunlight at night keeps you up.

> ANSES recommended buying "warm white" LED lighting

This line shows LEDs aren't even really the hazard. It's akin to saying a
substance was found that prevents cancer and the article saying that its
sunscreen.

~~~
CuriousSkeptic
Warm white refers to some particular average. But how do you find led’s that
don’t hide a spike of blue light in that average? Most places where I run into
led-lights don’t advertise the spectral distribution.

~~~
_ph_
I really hope, someone makes a cheap spectrometer as a smartphone accessory.
That would be the best way to quickly assess the properties of light sources.
Beyond the health impact, one wants to know the light spectrum when e.g.
selecting lamps for fish tanks or plant lighting.

As a very coarse but easily available poor-mans spectrometer, I have been
taking pictures of a greycard with my camera in raw-mode. Looking at the
histogram balanced for a fixed color temperature, e.g. sunlight, for the
r,g,b-channels gives very different results depending on different light
sources. While you don't see a true spectrum, just the strength of the blue
vs. the green and red channel usually is very revealing.

~~~
gtrubetskoy
Any compact disk works as a spectrometer.

[https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~zhuxj/astro/html/spectrometer.html](https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~zhuxj/astro/html/spectrometer.html)

~~~
NIL8
I've never seen this. Thanks!

------
tzs
One thing I never see mentioned when it comes to blue light and its effect on
circadian rhythms is whether it is the absolute level of blue light that
matters, or the relative amount compared to other concurrent light, or the
relative amount compared to some earlier time such as the peak blue level over
the last day.

It is relevant for figuring out strategies to avoid having blue light mess
with your sleep. If it is an absolute level, then you either need to keep
light sources low enough at night so that they can't have a blue component
that is too high, or you need to find out the spectrum of the light and figure
out the maximum level you can set the source to so that the blue won't be too
high.

If it is just the relative amount compared to concurrent light, then as long
as you use lights that have an acceptable spectrum you should be able set
these as bright as you want without messing up your sleep.

If it is relative to something like the peak for the day, then there is a
possibility that instead of turning down blue at night you could turn it up
during the day to raise that peak to give you more blue leeway at night.

~~~
DtnB
I actually looked into this recently and found some articles(which I have
since lost) that explained that it would appear that the delta between blue
light in the morning and at night is the mechanism by which our circadian
rhythm seems to work.

However, working with the idea that blue light is photo toxic, it is most
likely better to reduce your blue light at night rather than increase it in
the morning.

I wanted to do this experiment with dosing myself with blue light in the
morning but I abandoned that after seeing research on photo toxicity

Perhaps establishing a morning habit of going and standing in front of an east
facing window might be a worthy experiment?

~~~
sizzle
Just looked up blue light photo toxicity, that is some scary stuff! So is
staring at blue light computer monitors all day causing corneal cell death?

How much is this increasing the risk of macular degeneration?

~~~
rangibaby
> Just looked up blue light photo toxicity, that is some scary stuff! So is
> staring at blue light computer monitors all day causing corneal cell death?

I think you're going to be OK. There is a very large, strong (stronger than
any monitor) source of blue light that your eyes can handle at least 12 hours
of exposure per day to

~~~
DtnB
While you are right to ward off this person's paranoia and we really shouldn't
be completely freaking out about light exposure from our phones and such.

I think you are minimizing the issue. We wear sunglasses when it is bright
(and should as it can be harmful to our eyes), we don't stare directly at the
sun, we don't have it anywhere near as close to our faces, and we don't have
the sunlight at night which adds another 2-4 hours of exposure to blue light.

There would appear to be more intense blue light in an LED than coming from
the sun. This page while not a particularly good primary source has some
comparisons of the intensity of the blue light in LEDs vs sunlight.
[https://iristech.co/pwm-flicker/](https://iristech.co/pwm-flicker/)

"The use of blue light is becoming increasingly prominent in our society, and
a large segment of the world population is now subjected to daily exposure
(from a few minutes to several hours) of artificial light at an unusual time
of the day (night). Because light has a cumulative effect and many different
characteristics (e.g., wavelength, intensity, duration of the exposure, time
of day), it is important to consider the spectral output of the light source
to minimize the danger that may be associated with blue light exposure. Thus,
LEDs with an emission peak of around 470–480 nm should be preferred to LEDs
that have an emission peak below 450 nm. Although we are convinced that
exposure to blue light from LEDs in the range 470–480 nm for a short to medium
period (days to a few weeks) should not significantly increase the risk of
development of ocular pathologies, this conclusion cannot be generalized to a
long-term exposure (months to years). Finally, we believe that additional
studies on the safety of long-term exposure to low levels of blue light are
needed to determine the effects of blue light on the eye."

[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4734149/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4734149/)

Basically, we shouldn't go out of our way to expose ourselves to excess blue
light if we can help it. We don't know what it does entirely. Its not worth
losing your mind over either but its not quite simple as 'the sun is blue.
you'll be fine'

~~~
tzs
> There would appear to be more intense blue light in an LED than coming from
> the sun.

I was surprised at how intense LEDs are. When I got my eclipse viewing glasses
[1] for viewing the 2017-08-21 eclipse I spent some time trying them out on
every seemingly bright light source around my house and my office.

The only things that were easily visible through the eclipse glasses were a
3500 lumen 200 watt halogen bulb, and the white LEDs from an iPhone 6 plus
flashlight app, a hand cranked emergency flashlight, and an LED head lamp.

[1]
[https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B007MD8E0Q/](https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B007MD8E0Q/)

------
mrmondo
LED lighting panels in our office is so bad it looks as if there is a constant
haze or fog in the office.

A number of people in the office were complaining of visual fatigue and a
hazing effecting especially after working 3+ hours, additionally multiple
people had noted that colours seemed diluted or ‘dulled’.

The light spectrum seems to be missing parts of the visible light spectrum, to
test this I acquired and installed high CRI lights and the area in inch I
installed them lead to people satin to that they felt less sleep, more alert
and more comfortable - of course these are all subjective results.

Subjective TLDR; LED lighting isn’t inherently bad IMO, but bad LED lighting
is bad.

~~~
timcederman
Some of the issues (including the visual hazing) could be exacerbated by poor
indoor air quality.

~~~
clarry
Glad to know it can be solved by installing a light.

------
_ph_
Most (but not all) white LEDs have a specific property: the LED itself is
creating pure blue light. To create the appeareance of white light, a part of
the blue light is then converted to wavelengths in the green-red region via a
phosphor coating. But, especially in cheaper configurations, it still leaves a
pronounced blue emission line shaping the spectrum like this:

    
    
        0
        0    00000
        0 00000000000
       0000000000000000
    

With some coatings, the blue line completely vanishes, creating a light
distribution close to an incandescent lamp, but others have a very pronounced
line. In the light (sorry) of the report, it sounds reasonable to require a
certain minimum "spectrum quality" for lightbulbs beyond a certain power
output.

~~~
mopsi
How does this look like to you?

[https://i.imgur.com/rQaopcS.png](https://i.imgur.com/rQaopcS.png)

Taken from Philips A60 leaflet.

~~~
_ph_
This looks like a very good spectrum - pretty much like the best "warm" LEDs
you can get. The blue peak is almost gone - or you can discuss whether it has
a peak or a small weakness in the green-blue area.

------
davidy123
Regardless of the ultimate veracity of this (health guidance is …), there's
still a benefit. So many shops have switched to selling "LED lighting,"
without distinguishing the quality. So there is a lot of harsh lighting being
sold, that lasts a long time, which is a shame because colour temperature
really does have a big effect. I was subjected to this in a lighting shop,
where I was requesting fixtures that took a standard bulb, so I could plug in
my own LED bulbs with controllable colour temperature, but the salesperson
just couldn't see how that was better than their integrated LED systems.

------
ajuc
I don't know about the damage to eyes, but I can confirm problem with not
getting "sleepy feeling" while using a computer late at night.

And the solutions for me was a software that gradually changes the color
scheme of the operating system to be more red and less blue.

I'm using it since almost a year and it significantly helped with going to
sleep earlier. I simply get sleepy at 22-23, even when doing stuff on a
computer. Before installing the software I could sit for hours and notice it's
already 02:00 and I'm not sleepy, just tired.

------
blunte
Anecdotal, but I love "daylight" white (which often looks quite blue to people
at first). I spent a year of home office working with fantastic bright 6500K
LED lighting, plus great big monitors calibrated.

At the end of a year of far too many hours worked (staring into screens), I
was having strange vision problems and periods where my eyes actually felt
pressurized and uncomfortable in their sockets.

When my insane project was over and I took some time off, my eye problems went
away.

It's a shame if 6500K light is harmful, because I find it so energizing and
refreshing compared to eye-burning yellow light.

This article said in passing that they cast doubts as to the efficacy of blue
blocking glasses, but I don't see why proper filters on glasses wouldn't be
effective.

------
seanalltogether
The article specifically calls out LED filament bulbs, but those bulbs aren't
designed to actually output blue light to the user, they output the light that
the phosphor coating on top should output, which is usually yellowish at
2800K. Are they talking specifically about LED bulbs and displays that still
use separate RGB LEDs?

~~~
Itsdijital
Warm white LEDs still have about 30% of the blue light emission that cool
white LEDs have. I really think the article is talking about cool white
primarily though.

------
samsolomon
Interesting that the color of the light appears to be the issue here. When
researching LED bulbs I read a ton of complaints about the flickering causing
people headaches. It's hasn't caused me any issues though.

If you're curious about the flicker, it's visible by filming an LED bulb at
1/8 speed. I posted some videos here a while back.

[https://productdork.com/t/led-lightbulb-
recommendations/272/...](https://productdork.com/t/led-lightbulb-
recommendations/272/4)

~~~
Tempest1981
Certain cars have taillights that flicker like crazy. What percentage of
people are sensitive to this? The car makers don't seem to care.

------
AngryData
After buying LEDs by diode type online, instead of just whatever generic shit
they sell at the hardware store for light fixtures, it really became apparent
how trash most hardware store lights were. Not to mention many of the
replacement LED socket lights are flickering from the mains frequency. The
efficiency in random socket versions are crap compared to the high efficiency
diodes you can buy if you look in the right places, often the store versions
are around 60-100 lumens per watt, when you can get closer to 180-200 lumens
per watt.

~~~
ourlordcaffeine
Can you give any pointers? I'm finding it quite hard to find datasheets and
spectral measurements for bulbs sold online, they really don't give consumers
much information.

~~~
butteroverflow
I know of a very good resource [0], although it is in Russian. But I think you
can still make use of the comparison table [1]. Here are the rough
translations of the columns:

    
    
        * brand;
        * model;
        * description;
        * price (RUB, divide it by 65 to get USD);
        * power in watts;
        * luminous flux in lumen;
        * efficiency (lumen / watt);
        * power of an equivalent incandescent lamp;
        * color temperature, K;
        * CRI;
        * light cone angle in degrees;
        * flicker coefficient;
        * supports switches with indicator lights;
        * overall rating (from 1 through 5, with 1 being lowest);
        * warranty in months;
        * can you still find it for sale?
    

There are lots of information on each lamp if you click on the model name.

[0] [http://lamptest.ru](http://lamptest.ru)

[1] [http://lamptest.ru/results/](http://lamptest.ru/results/)

------
6DM
Does this mean we can finally outlaw blue headlights? (Note: I am joking, but
I wish it were true.)

~~~
workingpatrick
AFAIK, most of the actually 'blue' headlights are not street legal. A Product
of cheap aftermarket "HID Kits" or cheap XENON bulbs. Also, at least in Texas,
basically any modification to your OEM headlights is verboten.

~~~
hnick
Are they actually 'blue'? I ask because of your quotes.

I heard before that we perceive slightly yellow light as white (because of the
sun) and these 'blue' lights are really pure white but our perception shifts
it.

~~~
Tempest1981
They have a color temperature of 6500k (or 8000k? or higher?), which is a very
blue tint of white.

------
Causality1
A lot of their claims are unscientific.

>Teenagers' lenses aren't fully crystallized so blue light is more prone to
disrupt their sleep patterns

------
benbojangles
Blue Spectrum light could be a big factor towards many health problems in the
upper northern hemisphere (And probably lower southern), depression, macular
retinopathy, migranes, tinnitus, affected autonomic function, CTE, post
concussion syndrome - all affected by blue light, winter sun, white/blue LEDS,
Car headlamps.

~~~
rohan1024
Why do you say that it will only affect particular regions? Do you mean people
around equator are not that much affected by blue light?

~~~
benbojangles
I'm referring to the higher levels of blue spectrum light in the outer
hemisphere compared to more red spectrum nearer to equatorial

~~~
leoedin
The sun is more blue spectrum than any LED. The only way the northern
hemisphere would have problems with too much blue light (compared to the
equator) is if it was in midsummer, when there's a lot of daylight.

Whatever blue light our LEDs produce indoors in winter is a fraction of that
produced by the sun.

------
gppk
Little unsure how this is new findings:

> "exposure to an intense and powerful [LED] light is 'photo-toxic' and can
> lead to irreversible loss of retinal cells and diminished sharpness of
> vision,"

This is the reason we have light and laser safety standards to ensure that
people aren't being exposed to dangerous levels of light...

------
jwr
I've been working on designing my lighting system for home. I find these
reports annoying: without specifics, it's really just FUD. I am looking at
datasheets for various LEDs, comparing CRIs and spectral distributions and I
know already that my lights are going to be as "warm white" as possible (e.g.
close to 2700K with a mix of higher-K added only during daytime) with the blue
peak being as small as possible.

Incidentally, I actually DO want to add blue at times, because at my latitude
days are short and dark during winter time and daylight temperature lighting
seems to be beneficial during daytime hours.

How do I make use of "information" in this article? Do I reject LEDs
altogether? Do I look to minimize certain frequencies? If so, which ones
specifically? Do I avoid exceeding certain intensity? (then give me at
threshold for Lux at eye position) Or do I avoid exceeding certain energy
radiated within a specific band?

It's frustrating, because apart from the FUD, there is little to go on.

~~~
Itsdijital
Its the blue light, when I worked with "hard" blue LEDs (~460nm), I had to
wear special glasses or I could literally feel my retinas melting.

Just stick with warm white and you'll be good. Warm white still emits a fair
amount of blue light, but its approximately around 1/3 that of cool or
daylight white LEDs.

Remember that natural sunlight is many orders of magnitude stronger than any
5000K LED and unlike LEDs has tons of UV as well. You could likely offset any
damage and then some just by wearing sunglasses anytime you are out in the
sun.

~~~
hevi_jos
Are you sure of that?

I believe humans have evolved to accept certain damage as natural and it just
repairs itself.

When I expose myself to moderate amounts of light, my body reacts making my
skin darker, which protects my skin against light.

Think for example gravity, that is exerting acceleration that damages our
bodies, so our body has to react making bones and muscles. If we go to space
and do not apply damage, the human becomes weaker, as it atrophies.

If we make a person to breathe in a total clean environment(filtered air), the
immune system atrophies, then if you make the person breath normal air, you
can kill her.

Of course we also know that too much is very bad, because it exceeds the
limits of the human body to repair and something breaks down.

Common sense is key. If you go to the mountain or the sea in summer in Spain,
Italy, Greece, Morroco, New Zealand... you should be extremely careful. This
exposure in thousands of times more than indoors(or countries like UK) and UV
light skyrockets.

------
fouronnes3
maybe my esp8266 2500 lumens led strip alarm clock wasn't such a good idea :O

------
derefr
How “intense and powerful” are we talking? Does this mean that 30mins daily
exposure to an LED-based [10000lm] light-therapy lamp is a bad idea (compared
to a non-LED-based light-therapy lamp)?

------
rconti
Unrelated, because IR is on the other side of the visible spectrum from blue
light, but I'm convinced some day we'll find that IR is damaging to the eye.
Every time I see those creepy glowing green eyes coming from the baby's room
on friends' and relatives' baby monitors, I just shudder. I can't see blasting
an infant with invisible light for no good reason.

~~~
anonuser123456
The sun emits IR.

~~~
rconti
... and blue light?

------
UI_at_80x24
AC driven vs DC driven.

The 'quality' of light that is supplied from a DC power source is superior to
that from a rectified AC source.

Cheap rectifiers are the scourge and cancer of this lighting tech. While not
discounting the affect of the blue light + phosphor even 'cheap' LED's provide
a better light output when DC driven.

Note: I can see/sense LED flicker (florescent tubes [or ballasts] nearing
their end-of-life, and CFL's too.) So I am very sensitive to it. I also LOVE
super-bright high kelvin 'cool/cold' 6500K+ lights in my home. My wife
complains that it's like being in an operating room.

I wonder how much of the blue-light dislike/distrust is based on a biological
leaning towards a preference to carbon-rich fire/flame orange-hue's.

i.e. a campfire or candle vs incandescent light vs halogen vs florescent vs
LEDs on a scale of like to hate.

~~~
kitsunesoba
Blue/white fluorescent or LED lights drive me crazy in a home setting. If I
could replace the one in my apartment’s kitchen I would. Their brightness is
fine but their coldness keeps me on edge somehow.

~~~
UI_at_80x24
It really is interesting how light affects us like that. I suffer from a
congenital cornea disease and am slowly going blind until I get a transplant.
I've often wondered if that's how/why I like the lights the way I do. They
always feel "cheery" to me. It brightens my mood.

