Excluding communicable diseases, most people stay fairly health until 50+ and many hunter gathers likely lived into there early 90's. Infection likely a major risk, but antibiotics are very recent and less necessary than frequently assumed.
Excluding communicable diseases, most people stay fairly health until 50+ and many hunter gathers likely lived into there early 90's. Infection likely a major risk, but antibiotics are very recent and less necessary than frequently assumed.
It's definitely not an argument in terms of looking to hunter gatherers for diet or fitness advice, though :)
Though as to disease it's not just population density. Domesticated animals mostly birds, pigs, and cattle for example created a larger pool to spread disease. Though diseases will spread from primates to humans with minimal contact.
PS: You could also have separate populations with minimal contact and have fewer diseases evolve. So, we could have high population density as long as people did not travel or keep animals.
I guess I'm not informed enough to start picking a number, but as far as I can tell, the life expectancy upon reaching adulthood has historically been notably lower than it is today, even prior to the horrors of civilization.
Measles, Smallpox, Typhus, and Cholera for example where all major and easily spread diseases.
The point is it's not as bad as you might think. Consider cavities, without refined sugar and massive quantities of grains there actually far less common.
That said, late stage hunter gathers where probably much worse off.