Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind · chapter 5 · id sapiens-c5-02-hunter-gatherers-were-healthie

“Hunter-gatherers were healthier than early farmers, with better nutrition, fewer diseases, and more varied diets based on skeletal evidence.”

needs contextconfidence: high⚠ extracted by pipeline, re-audit pending

Receipts

Larsen (1995), Annual Review of Anthropology 24:185-213DOI registry: valid

Caries rates increase from ~1-2% in foragers to 8-15% in early agriculturalists. Porotic hyperostosis and cribra orbitalia (iron-deficiency anemia markers) generally increase with agriculture.

Gurven & Kaplan (2007), Population and Development Review 33(2):321-365DOI registry: valid

Modern hunter-gatherer modal adult lifespan is 68-78 years, but with ~40-50% child/juvenile mortality. Life expectancy at birth is low (~30-35) but conditional on surviving childhood is quite high.

Walker et al. (2009), American Journal of Physical Anthropology 139:109-125DOI registry: valid

Porotic hyperostosis is multifactorial -- not always indicating iron-deficiency anemia. Skeletal indicators of health are more complex to interpret than often presented.

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