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Human body temperature generally decreasing due to unknown reasons

Human body temperature generally decreasing due to unknown reasons

BY Carol 9 Nov,2020 Temperature Tsimane

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Some physiologists analyzed case files in European and American history and found out that the body temperature of modern people has become lower. At that time, the suspicion might be related to the modern lifestyle.

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For many years, people in the United States and the United Kingdom have had a body temperature lower than the usual 37°C - the generally accepted average. 

Now, new research on Tsimane, a relatively remote indigenous tribe in Bolivia, shows that this trend is not accidental, nor is it a phenomenon that can only be explained by modern lifestyles. On the contrary, this situation exists even in rural and tropical regions where medical conditions are extremely poor and infections are widespread.

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When anthropologists first worked with the Tsimanes in 2002, they found out that the average body temperature of a local adult was 37°C - exactly the average body temperature in Europe two centuries ago.

Only 16 years later, the measured temperature then dropped to 36.5°C (36.53 for women, 36.57 for men), a rapid decline of 0.03°C every year.

"In less than two decades, the level of decline we have seen is similar to the level of decline observed in the United States for about two centuries." explains Michael Gurven, an anthropologist from the University of California, Santa Barbara.

This result has relatively high credibility. The analysis is based on a large sample of 5,500 adults and approximately 18,000 long-term observations, with the consideration of many other factors that may affect a person’s body temperature.

No matter how the researchers segment the results—even if they only analyze fully healthy adults—the body temperature drop still exists. 

Although some may be from a low-income, the results of the study are basically consistent with a recent study in the United States, which found that "the current average body temperature of the population in high-income countries is 1.6% lower than the pre-industrial era [36.4°C]".

But this study in Americans only looked at a single population, thus it cannot explain why this decline occurred.


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