expectancy in older age. "A mother giving birth in spring spends the last phase of her pregnancy in winter, when she will eat less vitamins than in summer," said Gabriele Doblhammer, one of a team of scientists who carried out the research. "When she stops breast-feeding and starts giving her baby normal food, it's in the hot weeks of summer when babies are prone to infections of the digestive system." In Austria, adults born in autumn (October-December) lived about seven months longer than those born in spring (April-June), and in Denmark adults with birthdays in autumnoutlived those born in spring by about four months. In the southern hemisphere, the picture was similar. Adults born in the Australian autumn - the European spring - lived about four months longer than those born in the Australian spring. The study focused on people born at the beginning of the 20th century, using death certificates and census data. Although nutrition at all times of the year has improved since then, the seasonal pattern persists, Doblhammer said.

一位奥地利科学家认为，秋天出生的人比生在春天的人活得长，在上了年纪的时候也更不容易得慢性病。马克斯·普朗克人口研究学院位于德国北部城市罗斯托克，该学院的科学家们通过分析奥地利、丹麦和澳大利亚3国超过100万的人口普查数据得出结论，人们50岁以后的平均寿命与出生月份之间存在关联。母亲在怀孕期间所吃的东西因季节而有不同，一年里不同时间流行的传染病也不一样，两者都会对新生儿的健康发生影响，并进而影响他们到老年时的平均寿命。进行此项研究的科学家小组成员加布里埃尔·多布哈默说：“春天分娩的母亲孕期的最后阶段适逢冬季，因此她摄入的维生素要比夏季时少。她停止哺乳开始让婴儿正常进食的时候又正好赶上夏天最热的那几个星期，这时候婴儿容易发生消化系统感染。“在奥地利，秋天（10至11月）出生的成人大约要比春天（4至6月）出生的多活7个月，而在丹麦这一差异大约是4个月。南半球的情况也差不多。生于澳洲秋天——欧洲的春天——的成人寿命比春天出生的长大约4个月。研究者们使用死亡证明和人口普查数据作为参考资料，主要对象是20世纪初出生的人。多布哈默说，尽管人们在一年中各个时期的营养状况与那时相比都已经有所改善，这样的季节性差异却依然存在。