Milk Teeth and Modern Health

Medievalist.net posted on Sept. 6th about a new study of milk teeth on 10th century Anglo-Saxon children, which studies how the children grew from in utero onwards. The hope is that the study will help scientists studying modern health concerns.

“There is a growing consensus that factors such as low birthweight have a significant impact on our likelihood of developing conditions such as heart disease, diabetes and obesity and that the first 1,000 days from conception onwards set our ‘template’,” she [=Dr Beaumont] notes. “By analysing the milk teeth of modern children in the same way as the Anglo-Saxon skeletons, we can measure the same values and see the risk factors they are likely to face in later life, enabling measures to be taken to mitigate such risks.”