ACCORDING TO the NHS, around two million people in the UK suffer each winter from Seasonal Affective Disorder, a condition characterised by feelings of depression, lethargy, listlessness and lack of energy.
It is sometimes known as the ‘winter blues’, although a small number of people actually experience the condition in reverse, feeling worse in summer and more energised in winter.
SAD was first identified by a particularly astute psychiatrist, Dr Norman Rosenthal, who led a team to study the phenomenon in the early Eighties. Elaving noticed that many of his patients were ‘under