Saison et climat comme contraintes de la survie des enfants. L'expérience italienne au XIXe siècle

The bourgeois‐pichat's biometric method and the influence of climate: New evidences from late 19th‐century Italy

“…Nonetheless, these characteristics make Sardinia more similar to the Southern regions' group rather than to the Northern ones. As expected, the grouping resulting from the cluster analysis resembles to a large extent the climatic subdivision of Italy, distinguishing between the Continental climate of Northern and large part of Central Italy, and the Mediterranean climate of Southern regions and the islands (Breschi, Livi, and Bacci, 1986). At this point, if the Bourgeois-Pichat's method works properly, we should find that the distinction among clusters is driven by variations in the exogenous rate of infant mortality.…”

“…The heterogeneity of Italian climatic conditions has been specifically cited to explain much of the difference observed in the levels of past infant and neonatal mortality among Italian regions (Breschi and Livi Bacci, 1986;Breschi et al, 2000Breschi et al, , 2004Ferrari and Livi Bacci, 1985). Northern and part of Central Italy enjoy a continental climate, featured by a cold winter and a very hot and humid summer.…”

Birth Seasonality in Present-Day Italy, 1993–2005

“…One could postulate that the southern population has been subject to evolutionary mechanisms to avoid childbearing in the hottest months of the year (summer/early fall), when maximum temperatures frequently reach over 40ºC. This hypothesis is supported by the fact that in pre-industrialized Italy cohorts born in winter had a neonatal infant mortality rate four times higher than those born in the spring/summer season in the North, whereas in the South children born in summer were the most at risk (Breschi and Livi Bacci, 1986). Whether this finding might be related to the specific structure of respondent vs non-respondent to the length of day in the Italian population, as suggested by Bronson (2004a), is a question that is impossible to answer here.…”

The joint effect of maternal malnutrition and cold weather on neonatal mortality in nineteenth-century Venice: An assessment of the hypothermia hypothesis

“…To be sure, quite a number of studies have highlighted significant differences in neonatal and infant mortality according to month or season of birth, for both historical and contemporary populations (Lenzi 1960;Knodel 1984;Galloway 1985;Williams 1992;Huck 1994;Derosas 2002a). It has also been shown in several studies that in countries with relatively mild climates, such as north-eastern Italy, the winter months were actually more dangerous to newborns' survival than in countries with much harsher climates, such as Russia or Sweden (Breschi and Livi Bacci 1986;Breschi et al 2000Breschi et al , 2003Oris et al 2004). However, Rossi and Tesolat's work is the first to describe explicitly this unique long-term trend in neonatal mortality in conjunction with the role played by winter cohorts.…”