Built on bones: the history of humans in the city - Science Weekly podcast

Ian Sample and bioarchaeologist Brenna Hassett explore the history of our relationship with an urban lifestyle - the good, the bad, and the ugly

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In 2014, the United Nations estimated that 54% of the world's population lives in urban areas, a figure expected to increase to 66% by 2050. But life for Homo sapiens wasn't always like this. Rewind 200,000 years and our early human ancestors were fully or semi-nomadic hunter-gatherers, often living in small communities. But what happened between then and now? Why did humans choose to move to villages and then cities? And what has this dramatic change in lifestyle done to our health and our relationships with others?