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Human Body Temperature has Dropped in the Past 150 Years

posted by martyb on Monday January 20 2020, @02:38AM   Printer-friendly
from the you're-as-cold-as-ice dept.

RandomFactor writes:

The planet may be warming, but a recent study indicates that mankind is going the other direction.

Researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine have established that people's bodies are now typically cooler than the textbook figure of 37C, first established by German physician Carl Reinhold August Wunderlich in 1868.

The study shows that modern-day men have a body temperature 0.58C lower than their 19th century counterparts, while women's are 0.32C lower.

This decrease has been attributed to "changes in our environment over the past 200 years, which have in turn driven physiological changes". However, the study acknowledges that establishing cause and effect remains "inherently unprovable".

The rate of decline is about 0.03°C per birth decade. Body temperature is a marker for metabolic rate and could partially explain changes in human health and longevity over time.

Journal Reference:
Myroslava Protsiv, Catherine Ley, Joanna Lankester, Trevor Hastie, Julie Parsonnet. Decreasing human body temperature in the United States since the Industrial Revolution, (DOI: doi:10.7554/eLife.49555)

Original Submission

 
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  • (Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 20 2020, @06:51AM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 20 2020, @06:51AM (#945697)

    Then how come she is always complaining about being cold and messing with the thermostat?

    This is rather indelicate, but how well do you know this "she"? Some things do not transfer in gender re-assignment surgery.

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  • (Score: 0, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 20 2020, @11:53AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 20 2020, @11:53AM (#945753)

    I'm a crossdresser so I have experience with silky smooth skin. If I shave my entire body? I'll feel a LOT colder. It also doesn't help women's clothing is a lot thinner and more revealing than Joe's outfit.

    But I'll be damned if that deters me from 👗dressing👠 up.