Title: Human body temperature has decreased in United States, study finds | News Center | Stanford Medicine
Headings: Human body temperature has decreased in United States, study finds
Human body temperature has decreased in United States, study finds
Digging into the past
Potential causes of colder body temperature

Content: Public health has improved dramatically in the past 200 years due to advances in medical treatments, better hygiene, greater availability of food and improved standards of living. The authors also hypothesize that comfortable lives at constant ambient temperature contribute to a lower metabolic rate. Homes in the 19 th century had irregular heating and no cooling; today, central heating and air conditioning are commonplace. A more constant environment removes a need to expend energy to maintain a constant body temperature. “Physiologically, we’re just different from what we were in the past,” Parsonnet said. “ The environment that we’re living in has changed, including the temperature in our homes, our contact with microorganisms and the food that we have access to. All these things mean that although we think of human beings as if we’re monomorphic and have been the same for all of human evolution, we’re not the same. We’re actually changing physiologically.” Other Stanford co-authors of the study are senior research scientist Catherine Ley, PhD;