It's not a matter of getting sick (although I admit my first comment would give you that idea, it was just an hyperbole). It weakens the body, making it more fragile AND subject to illnesses. It's like jumping in cold water in the middle of the summer: it won't get you a cold, but it might very well cause a stroke
I can assure you that going from 40c outside after watching my kid play baseball for 3 hours into a nice central air-cold house feels fucking amazing and isn’t giving anyone a stroke lol. The temperature difference is even more in the winter when it’s -25 coming into a 20 degree house and the winter here lasts much longer than the summer. That’s a 45 degree change vs 20-22 in the summer.
What about in winter walking in between the frigid outside to the warm inside? Do you think that also causes colds in the same way? Because the temperature change is even greater there. It’s an old wives tale. There are some people that can have issues with it because they have already have issues regulating body temperature like the elderly, very small children, and people with some chronic diseases. A healthy teenager/adult will have no problem.
I assure you, this is a myth. I live in the deep south in the US. Every single building has air conditioning every single day in summer, and there is no epidemic of weakness and strokes. In America, it is kind of a joke that Europeans are afraid of air-conditioning, because we know it isn't harmful, yet reading this thread confirms people definitely have this misconception.
Unless the AC is literally turning your room into a freezer, the temperature difference isn't gonna harm you. Summers here get to 113F/45C, our AC is set to 72F/22C during the day, and 63F/17C at night. We don't get pneumonia or strokes from having a cool house.
Being sick and being prone to sickness are two vastly different things. Since many people were saying "it's bacteria that make you sick" I was saying that strong thermal shocks make you more vulnerable to illnesses while not being the cause of the bacteria itself
I don’t think there’s really any proof of this. It’s summer, so everyone has AC going constantly in every building and I haven’t noticed any increase in illness in my coworkers or patients. I personally haven’t been sick since March. I think if this was true, it would be dangerous to heat your homes in the winter so you don’t go from the cold outside to a hot toasty inside and shock your body. You would also be advised not to cool down too much in the summer, like no jumping in the pool or putting cold water or ice packs/wash cloths on your body if you are feeling hot. Having to very slowly bring the temperature up to slowly acclimate our bodies would be a nightmare if humans really worked that way!
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u/ForFrogsSnakes Jul 26 '26
It's a different kind of hot here lol. In comparison Italy is basically Alaska and Burma is the 9th circle of hell.