Conserving the Axolotl

The waterways of Mexico are the only natural habitat of the axolotl — “water monster” in Nahuatl — although the amphibian is abundant in captivity and a popular pet in various corners of the world. But Zambrano says that differences between wild and captive-bred creatures are considerable because captive axolotls experience losses in physiological and behavioral capabilities.

While Zambrano’s original idea was for surviving axolotls to wiggle on their own into the restored canals or refuges, researchers are also looking into the possibility of introducing captive-bred creatures to these spaces themselves. Before that can be done, however, Zambrano said they need more information about the salamanders’ genetics and reproductive capabilities, among other things. It’s known that farmers sometimes release axolotls into canals after raising them in aquariums, but the researchers say this is generally frowned upon due to environmental regulations.

“The quality of the water is reduced a lot when you put in pesticides and fertilizers because they kill everything, including the axolotl.”  If the axolotl goes extinct in the wild, it would be a tremendous loss to Mexico and the world, he said.

“It’s not only one of the most researched species in terms of genetics, but it’s an animal that’s closely connected to our Mexican culture.”

As Mexico City’s population has grown, intensive water pumping has depleted much of the underground sources that are used to feed the maze of canals. They now get treated wastewater from nearby plants, which has contributed to the decay of waterways and chinampas.

Eslava was already involved in clean-up projects and restoration efforts with other Xochimilco residents when Carlos Sumano came calling in 2020. He relished the idea of the project because the university’s sponsorship would help provide funding and resources to assist chinamperos in reactivating dormant chinampa agriculture.

“All the fertilizer we need is down there in the water,” he said. “All the vegetation that disintegrates there is very rich material; it’s what our ancestors used. That’s why chinampa farming was so rich. There was an enormous diversity of crops, and everything was done using traditional methods like mud and native seeds.”

Those traditions had gradually succumbed to new agricultural practices that were ushered in starting in the 1940s with the promise of greater yields.

“The ‘green revolution’ was this vision of increasing agricultural productivity as fast as possible, as best as possible, and that’s when the use of pesticides and fertilizers started to grow,’” Zambrano said. “But the quality of the water is reduced a lot when you put in pesticides and fertilizers because they kill everything, including the axolotl.”

“I’ve been farming for a long time, and I want to keep doing it here, in Xochimilco,” he said in a recent interview. “I don’t want chinampas to disappear.”

Neither does Eslava, who spends much of his time improving plots. He and Sumano recently brought six very young axolotls bred in aquariums to a narrow, restored canal. The minuscule creatures, which resembled tadpoles, wiggled out of a bucket and into the water. Sumano explained that the axolotls were placed there to be monitored for a few days, after which Eslava took them back out.

Zambrano believes the project has already started to reap benefits, like healthy species in some canals and growing interest in reactivating abandoned chinampas, though he notes that ambitious restoration projects such as this one take time and effort.

https://undark.org/2022/08/01/mexican-farmers-and-scientists-share-a-mission-saving-a-wetland/

Legends of 'Negrito' people living in Taiwan CONFIRMED: Skull of woman reveals 'short, dark-skinned people' lived on the island more than 6,000 years ago - before indigenous tribes - then suddenly disappeared

The ancient Taiwanese legend of 'short, dark skinned' people who lived in remote mountains and suddenly disappeared has been confirmed to be true following the discovery of a 'Negriot' woman's remains in a cave that dates back 6,000 years.

The nation's indigenous tribes have long shared stories about small stature hunter-gatherers who were already settled when they arrived 4,800 years ago - but a lack of evidence has shrouded this group in mystery for several hundred years.

A DNA analysis on the skull shows it is close to African samples and features of the cranium resemble Negritos of the Philippines and South Africa, who all are well known for their short stature and small body size.

Archaeologists also uncovered femur bones from the female, which suggest she stood about four feet, six inches tall.

It is still not known what happened to this ancient group, but researchers involved with the study suggest the arrival of the Austronesian peoples could have led to the decline and disappearance of the Negritos in Taiwan.

'The term 'Negrito', little black person, is a Spanish diminutive of negro, first used by the 16th-century Spanish missionaries to describe the hunter-gatherers in the Philippines,' reads the study published in World Archeology.

'As the Negrito groups are characterized by their short stature, dark skin, and frizzy hair, all groups of a similar phenotype in the neighboring region, including the Mani (Maniq) in southern Thailand, the Semang groups in Peninsular Malaysia, and the Andamanese in the Andaman Islands are often labeled together as the Negritos.'

There are 16 recognized Austronesian groups in Taiwan and all but one have similar legends about the Negrito people.

The legends about the apparent 'Negritos' of Taiwan were collected during three major cultural periods: the Chinese Qing Dynasty of 1683 to 1895, the Japanese Rule period of 1895 to 1945, and then the post-1945 era.

Several documents from the Quin Dynasty have mentioned the existence of 'small-statured and dark-skinned people' on the island, noting they spoke a different language and only intermarried among themselves.

During the Japanese period, scholars collected and interpreted the tales about Negrito people through field research among the Austronesian tribes - a total of 25 of these legends in Taiwan were collected.

After 1945, this topic had attracted more attention, and the number of collected stories increased to 258 through linguistic and ethnological field research.

The Austronesian groups, however, varied on opinions about Negritos.

Some of the indigenous tribes viewed them as their ancestors, while others saw them as 'aliens and enemies,' the study describes.

One tribe, the Saisiyat, claim they learned medicine, singing, dancing and other rituals from the who they called, Ta'ai.

More than 1,000 years ago, the Saisiyat killed what they believe to be the last village of Negritos in a battle over women - and the tribe still feels the guilt of their ancestors' actions.

The Saisiyat forced a battle, cornering so many people on a bridge that the entire tribe drowned when warriors tipped it into a fast-flowing mountain river Chu Fung-lu, master of ceremonies for the memorial held in Wufeng Village deep in the mountains of central Taiwan, told Reuters.

The woman's remains were found buried inside one of the largest Xiaoma caves that sits on the eastern coastline of the island.

Also in the layers of dirt were deposits of Neolithic pottery-bearing and Iron Age findings that date back between 2,000 and 6,200 years ago.

The position of the woman's remains suggest she was laid to rest in a squatting position, which matches other methods of hunter-gatherer graves in southern China and Southeast Asia from late Paleolithic (50,000 to 12,000 years ago) through Mesolithic (10,000 to 20,000 years ago) and Preceramic, which began 4,000 years ago.

Archaeologists determined the sex through the skull, as the pelvis was not available to analyze.

'The individual was ascertained to be female because of the gracile cranium, small mastoid processes, smooth occipital muscle attachment area, perpendicular and elevated frontal bone, and the smooth contour of the mandibular base,' according to the study.

The Negrito population is believed to be tied to the 'first layer' of anatomically modern humans who show a closer resemblance to Africans than present-day Eurasians who represent the 'second-layer.'

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-11291649/Legends-Negrito-people-living-Taiwan-CONFIRMED-study-says.html

 

Vanished arm of Nile helped ancient Egyptians transport pyramids materials

When the ancient Egyptians built the pyramids of Giza around 4,500 years ago, the Nile River had an arm — one that has long since vanished — with high water levels that helped laborers ship materials to their construction site, a new study finds.

The discovery builds on previous archaeological and historical findings that the Nile had an extra arm flowing by the pyramids. But now, by analyzing ancient pollen samples taken from earthen cores, it's clear that "the former waterscapes and higher river levels" gave the Giza Pyramid's builders a leg up, a team of researchers wrote in a paper published Aug. 29 in the journal the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences(opens in new tab).

The research sheds light on how the pyramids — royal tombs for the pharaohs Khufu, Khafre and Menkaure — rose to monumental heights. Their towering stature was achieved, in large part, thanks to the Nile's now-defunct Khufu branch, which "remained at a high-water level during the reigns of Khufu, Khafre, and Menkaure, facilitating the transportation of construction materials to the Giza Pyramid Complex," the team wrote in their paper.

Researchers have known for decades that the long-gone Khufu branch extended up to the Giza plateau in ancient times, but the new project aimed to find exactly how the water levels had changed over the past 8,000 years.

To reconstruct the Nile's past, in May 2019 the team drilled five cores into the Giza floodplain. The researchers measured the amount of pollen found in different parts of the cores to determine how pollen levels had changed over time. Time periods when water was plentiful should have more pollen than periods that were arid, the study authors wrote.

The pollen analysis revealed that at the time the ancient Egyptians built the Giza pyramids, water was plentiful enough that the Khufu branch would have flowed near the Giza pyramids. "It was a natural canal in the time of the fourth dynasty [when the pyramids were built]," study lead author Hader Sheisha, a physical geographer at Aix-Marseille University in France, told Live Science in an email.

Sheisha noted that the water level was important for pyramid construction. "It would be very difficult if not impossible to build the pyramids without the Khufu branch and without it having a good level, which provides enough accommodation space for the boats carrying such heavy blocks of stone," she said. When exactly the branch went extinct is not certain, but the research shows that by 2,400 years ago the water level of the branch was very low.

The finds fit well with previous archaeological finds, which revealed a harbor close to the pyramids, as well as ancient papyri records that detailed workers bringing limestone to Giza via boat, the team noted in their paper.

Live Science contacted several experts not involved with the research to get their thoughts. Most were unable to comment at press time, but one who did, Judith Bunbury, a geo-archaeologist at the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom, praised the research.

"The paper is an exciting contribution to our understanding of the dialogue between humans and their environment in Egypt within the context of changing climate," Bunbury told Live Science in an email.

https://www.livescience.com/giza-pyramids-built-nile-high-water

Did Nero really fiddle while Rome burned?

 
The Roman emperor Nero ranks among the most infamous rulers of the Roman Empire for supposedly fiddling while Rome burned. But did that really happen? And does Nero really deserve his bad reputation?

As with all stories, we have to consider the source.

Born on Dec. 15, A.D. 37, Nero became the fifth emperor of Rome and the last of the Julio-Claudians, the dynasty that founded the empire, according to archaeologist Francesca Bologna, who curated the Nero Project at the British Museum(opens in new tab) in London.

Nero was only 2 years old when his mother, Agrippina the Younger — whose great-grandfather was Augustus, the empire's first emperor — was exiled by Emperor Caligula. At age 3, Nero's father, Gnaeus Domitius Ahenobarbus, died, leaving him in the care of his aunt. When Caligula was murdered in A.D. 41 and succeeded by Emperor Claudius, Nero was reunited with Agrippina, who later married her uncle Claudius, Bologna noted.

Despite having a biological son, Claudius designated Nero, his great nephew and stepson, as his heir, and Nero ascended to power in A.D. 54 at the age of 16. But his reign was short: Nero died in A.D. 68 at age 30 after taking his own life.

Roman historians have contended that Nero killed Agrippina and two of his wives, only cared about his art, and had very little interest in ruling the empire, Bologna said. However, "our sources for Nero are people that hated him," Harold Drake, a research professor emeritus of history at the University of California, Santa Barbara, told Live Science. One always has to keep in mind that much of his reputation "was written for us by his adversaries," he said. Bologna agreed, noting in her post for the British Museum that accounts of Nero "were keen on representing him in the worst possible light."

In July A.D. 64, Nero was vacationing in Antium (what is now the seaside town of Anzio, Italy) when he learned about what later became known as the Great Fire of Rome, Drake said. Before the conflagration burned itself out a week later, 10 of Rome's 14 districts had burned to the ground and thousands in a city of 500,000 to 1 million people had lost everything.

Nero raced back to Rome. He arranged emergency shelter and supplies of food and drink for the public, and opened his own palace and gardens for shelter, Drake noted(opens in new tab).

So, if Nero wasn't in Rome when the conflagration started, what's the origin of the rumor that "he fiddled" while the empire's capital burned?

Nero fancied himself a musician. At some point during the relief efforts, a rumor said he consoled himself by singing about another great fire — the fall of Troy, the Homeric tale that's the focus of the Roman poet Virgil's epic poem "The Aeneid," Drake said.

"He had done everything he could to deal with the fire, and he was exhausted," Drake said. "Being of an artistic bent, he consoled himself by comparing this disaster to the fall of Troy, which Romans liked to think they descended from, via the mythical ancestor Aeneas."

But even if Nero did play music while Rome was burning, he would not have used a fiddle, as bowed instruments would not become popular for another 1,000 years, Drake said. Instead, to accompany himself, Nero probably would have used a cithara, a portable harp-like instrument with seven strings, he explained.

There was precedent for Romans acting in such a manner. For example, the historian Polybius wrote that as the Roman general Scipio Aemelianus watched Carthage being destroyed, he quoted Homer's "The Iliad," saying, "'And a time will come when holy Ilium shall fall, and Priam, and Priam's folk of the good ashen spear,'" Drake said. "He was not thinking of Carthage but expressing fear that a like fate awaited the Romans."

In the aftermath of the Great Fire of Rome, Nero offered financial incentives to landlords to clear their property of debris and begin rebuilding, insisted that developers use stone instead of wood, straightened and widened streets, and ensured an adequate water supply for the city, Drake said. "Does that seem like the activity of a madman?" he asked.

So why might history remember Nero as a bad ruler? Almost everything the modern world knows about Nero comes from two sources: Roman senators and Christians. To both, Nero was an enemy.

"In general, senators loved to indulge their fantasy of a restored republic, sometimes by engaging in assassination plots, and then being outraged when the emperor reacted with hostility," Drake said.

As for the Christians, Roman senator and historian Tacitus suggested that because a rumor began circulating that Nero was responsible for the fire, he looked for a scapegoat in the Christians. The result was that many died from crucifixions, fires and other means. This often led Christians to blame Nero for the persecution they would endure from the Roman Empire, Drake said.

All that said, "I don't want to fall into the trap of justifying everything Nero did just because he has suffered from bad press," Drake said. "Nero was unquestionably pampered and overindulged by his tutors and, like other tyrants at other times, became much more arbitrary in his actions."

In the end, although Nero might not have been a madman, "there's little reason to doubt that he became increasingly unstable" over the course of his reign, Drake said. After the Great Fire of Rome, a group of nobles tried to assassinate him, and Nero grew increasingly paranoid, according to Hareth Al Bustani, author of "Nero and the Art of Tyranny(opens in new tab)" (Independently published, 2021).

Perhaps, given all that happened to Nero, any instability late in his life "should come as no surprise," Drake said.

https://www.livescience.com/did-nero-fiddle-while-rome-burned?utm_campaign=368B3745-DDE0-4A69-A2E8-62503D85375D

The old person's lament

The poem below is about Ulysses -- more accuratey rendered as Odysseus -- Homer's hero in ancient Greece and king of Ithaca. Its line "I cannot rest from travel" summarizes a lot of old people today

Ulysses
BY ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON
It little profits that an idle king,
By this still hearth, among these barren crags,
Match'd with an aged wife, I mete and dole
Unequal laws unto a savage race,
That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me.
I cannot rest from travel: I will drink
Life to the lees: All times I have enjoy'd
Greatly, have suffer'd greatly, both with those
That loved me, and alone, on shore, and when
Thro' scudding drifts the rainy Hyades
Vext the dim sea: I am become a name;
For always roaming with a hungry heart
Much have I seen and known; cities of men
And manners, climates, councils, governments,
Myself not least, but honour'd of them all;
And drunk delight of battle with my peers,
Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy.
I am a part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch wherethro'
Gleams that untravell'd world whose margin fades
For ever and forever when I move.
How dull it is to pause, to make an end,
To rust unburnish'd, not to shine in use!
As tho' to breathe were life! Life piled on life
Were all too little, and of one to me
Little remains: but every hour is saved
From that eternal silence, something more,
A bringer of new things; and vile it were
For some three suns to store and hoard myself,
And this gray spirit yearning in desire
To follow knowledge like a sinking star,
Beyond the utmost bound of human thought.

This is my son, mine own Telemachus,
To whom I leave the sceptre and the isle,—
Well-loved of me, discerning to fulfil
This labour, by slow prudence to make mild
A rugged people, and thro' soft degrees
Subdue them to the useful and the good.
Most blameless is he, centred in the sphere
Of common duties, decent not to fail
In offices of tenderness, and pay
Meet adoration to my household gods,
When I am gone. He works his work, I mine.

There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail:
There gloom the dark, broad seas. My mariners,
Souls that have toil'd, and wrought, and thought with me—
That ever with a frolic welcome took
The thunder and the sunshine, and opposed
Free hearts, free foreheads—you and I are old;
Old age hath yet his honour and his toil;
Death closes all: but something ere the end,
Some work of noble note, may yet be done,
Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods.
The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks:
The long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: the deep
Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends,
'T is not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die.
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down:
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.
Tho' much is taken, much abides; and tho'
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

East German revival picking up

East Germans make up 14% of the country’s overall population but remain underrepresented in elite positions in big German companies, universities and government. None of the 40 blue-chip businesses traded on the Frankfurt stock exchange are located in the five states that used to form the German Democratic Republic, where GDP per capita is about 22% lower than in the west.

But a boom in eastern German cities, and the clusters of industry that surround them, is changing the picture. After years of dragging behind the rest of the country, Berlin – divided during the cold war but geographically very much an eastern city – has seen its GDP rise above the national average since 2020. Surrounding Brandenburg has been lifted by the arrival of Tesla’s first factory for electronic cars in Europe.

As supply chains fray around the globe, branches of industry are choosing Germany’s east for their return to Europe. Chipmaker Intel announced in March it would build two semiconductor factories in the city of Magdeburg, while a Canadian clean tech company is building Europe’s first lithium converter in Guben, Brandenburg.

Ample space, locally sourced renewable energy and federal subsidies exclusive to the eastern states are proving incentives, as is a high-speed rail network completed in 2017, connecting Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt and Thuringia to Berlin in the north and Munich in the south.

A feeling of being “left behind” in a transforming economy, one analysis by the left-liberal thinktank Progressives Zentrum found, was now as likely to be found in western regions such as the Ruhr valley or the Saarland. “East versus west, that’s a story of the past,” said Andrä Gärber, of the Social Democratic party (SPD)-tied Friedrich Ebert Foundation.

A newfound swagger was also on display when Schneider last week hosted a delegation of UK Labour party delegates searching for lessons to be drawn for England’s north, which has been economically outperformed by eastern Germany for over a decade.

“Their challenges are in a different league,” said one SPD delegate in the Thuringian state parliament after a lunchtime discussion in the spa town of Bad Tabarz with Lisa Nandy, the British shadow minister for levelling up, housing and communities.

At last September’s vote, Scholz’s SPD swept to victory in part due to massive gains in the north-east, where it fought back the conservative Christian Democratic Union and the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) mainly by focusing on economic issues such as wages and leaving culture wars to one side.

Identity politics, Schneider said, were toxic to voters in the east: “Because the East German state invested so much effort in telling its people how to speak, people are absolutely allergic here to being educated through language.”

Yet eastern Germany’s economic success stories remain fragile. Half a year into its job, Scholz’s government has moved quickly to pass a new minimum wage increase to €12 (£10.20) an hour, which comes fully into effect as of 1 October and will benefit every third or fourth worker in low-income regions such as Brandenburg or Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. But as Russia’s war in Ukraine is massively driving up the cost of living with rising gas prices and spiralling inflation, such political victories may soon barely register with voters as vows on wages are put to the test over the coming months.

One instrument through which the SPD and its Green and liberal coalition partners have vowed to drive up wages and union memberships is the Tariftreuegesetz – a law to make sure public contracts are only awarded to companies that are party to collective bargaining agreements.

While similar laws are already in place in 14 out of 16 German states, they are not always enforceable. “If we can only find companies that aren’t bound by collective bargaining agreements, then we have to go with them,” said Diana Lehmann, an SPD delegate in the Thuringian parliament.

Near Erfurt, where Schneider gained a direct mandate at least year’s federal elections, the Chinese battery manufacturer CATL is now building its first non-Chinese production facility for €1.8m, which it says will offer about 2,000 jobs in the area in the long run. But, for now, the Chinese company has mainly brought in Chinese workers, with rumours that the management is put off from hiring locally by German labour laws requiring eight-hour working days. Wages are said to be lower than hoped for.

With public attention focused on gas pipelines and arms deliveries, the government has also barely started to make the politically sensitive case that Germany needs to find political answers not just to a shortage of gas to power its industry, but also of workers.

“We have a massive labour shortage in all areas,” said Schneider. “Germany will need 7 million more workers by 2030. For this reason we are going to introduce one of the most liberal immigration laws in the world. And we will do it in such a way that it won’t lead to wage dumping.”

https://www.msn.com/en-au/money/markets/a-new-confidence-the-east-german-economy-finally-gets-a-boom/ar-AAZLVNG?li=AAgfYrC

Insomnia breakthrough as scientists discover the two most effective drugs yet

Oxford University experts examined more than 150 studies that tested the effects of 30 different drugs on thousands of adults suffering from sleeping problems.

Eszopiclone, sold under the brand Lunesta, and lemborexant, marketed as Dayvigo, were best for easing insomnia symptoms.

They worked better than benzodiazepines and Z-drugs, two powerful sleeping pills NHS bosses are trying to phase out.

Both pills are already used across Europe and the US. They are hypnotics which work by calming the brain to get someone to sleep very quickly.

Study leader Professor Andrea Cipriani said he expects British regulators to consider approving both drugs in light of the findings.

However, he noted they can trigger side effects, such as headaches, dizziness and nausea — similar to addictive benzodiazepines.

Professor Cipriani said non-pharmaceutical treatments, such as therapy, should still be the first-line treatment.

The problem, which affects one in six Britons, can usually get better if sufferers change their sleeping habits.

Symptoms include finding it hard to sleep, waking up several times in the night, waking up early and struggling to get back to sleep.

It can be triggered by stress, anxiety or depression, noise, a room that is too hot or cold, an uncomfortable bed, shift work, alcohol, caffeine or nicotine, as well as recreational drugs.

Adults need seven to nine hours of sleep per night.

Insomnia a can be short term – lasting three months or less  or long-term if it persists for more than 12 weeks.

Treatments include cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) sessions with a therapist, which can help change thoughts and behaviours that stop people from sleeping.

GPs rarely prescribe sleeping pills over concerns about their side effects and drug dependency.

Insomnia — defined as regular sleeping difficulties — is thought to affect up to one in 10 people in Europe.

It can lead to reduced productivity, increased absence from work and a higher risk of accidents.

Insomnia is also heavily linked with mental health disorders like depression as well as alcohol dependence.

First-line treatment includes encouraging 'sleep hygiene', simple methods like going to bed at the same time every night, exercising and limiting caffeine before bed.

Some patients may be referred for cognitive behavioural therapy — talking therapy that aims to manage problems by changing the way a person thinks. Britons can also be prescribed an app that provides a six-week self-help programme.

GPs may also prescribe sleeping pills. But this is rarely done as the drugs can trigger serious side effects and addiction.

However, 300,000 people in England are thought to be long-term users of Z-drugs and benzodiazepines.

Some take the drugs for other reasons, such as anxiety.

Professor Cipriani told a briefing for health and science journalists today there is 'little evidence' about how effective sleeping pills are in comparison to each other.

This raised the question of whether doctors are 'prescribing the right medication' to those who need it, she said.

Their study, published in The Lancet, reviewed 154 published and unpublished trials — completed by November 2021.

Experiments assessed tested effectiveness of 30 different insomnia drugs, in 44,089 adults with sleeping difficulties.

They looked at patients who were given drugs for four weeks — as well as those who took medication for three months.

Three-quarters were given a sleeping pill, while a quarter were given a placebo drug.

Volunteers reported their quality of sleep, whether they stopped taking the pill and any adverse events — such as dizziness, nausea, fatigue, headache and drowsiness.

The findings showed that eszopiclone and lemborexant out-performed other drugs.

A quarter of short-term eszopiclone-users reported that their symptoms improved, while 38 per cent of those who took it for three months said they were able to sleep more easily.

Meanwhile, one in five volunteers on lemborexant said their symptoms improved at four weeks, while 35 per cent said they had eased after three months.

However, researchers warned that up to half of patients on the two drugs were left feeling unwell.

For comparison, benzodiazepines, which is offered to patients in the UK, were found to be effective in the short-term — easing up to three in 10 users' symptoms.

But the researchers noted that information on their long-term effects is not available and patients do not tolerate them well, with up to six in 10 reporting side effects.

Z-drugs, such as zaleplon, benefited as few as 16 per cent of patients and also lacked long-term data.

And melatonin, another drug offered on the NHS, failed to show any material benefits, with only 18 per cent noticing an improvement and four in 10 reporting side effects, the team said.

The researchers stated the safety data on lemborexant was inconclusive but there appeared to be a risk of headaches, while eszopiclone-users reported dizziness and nausea.

Further studies are needed to determine how safe the two drugs are over time, the researchers said.

Professor Cipriani, a psychiatrist at the University of Oxford, said the findings are 'the most transparent and comprehensive picture of all the data available' on insomnia drugs.

He said the results can help doctors identify the most appropriate drug for their insomnia patients and said regulators should take the findings into account when deciding whether to approve eszopiclone and lemborexant.

'Clearly, the need to treat insomnia as effectively as possible is very important, as it can have knock-on effects for a patient’s health, their home lives and the wider health system,' Professor Cipriani said.

However, he warned that the study is 'not a recommendation that drugs should always be used as the first line of support to treat insomnia', warning that some can have 'serious side effects'.

But Professor Cipriani noted that the research shows some drugs 'can also be effective, and should be used in clinical practice, when appropriate'.

'For example, where treatments such as improved sleep hygiene and CBT have not worked, or where a patient wants to consider taking medication as part of their treatment,' he added.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-11013087/Insomnia-breakthrough-scientists-discover-two-effective-drugs-yet.html