I have always heard that in France RT is the norm at the doctors for all ages, but recently its changing. I know the French are less inhibited over the Human body then many countries are. The Scandinavian countries have been in general less inhibited as well. I have noticed a number of posters on here are from France, Sweden and Finland. If I'm reading the little flags correctly.
In Belgium, which is not that different from France in many respects, I have never and I repeat, never in my many decades living here ever had a rectal temperature taken by a doctor or in any other medical setting either for that matter.
I´m not saying that it is never done, but I have never had any experience of it being done. And I´m quite certain I am not that far from the norm when it comes to frequency of doctor´s visits. Nor have I ever heard anyone mention it either. My wife also worked for many years in several hospitals and she too never made any mention of it at all.
I fear that the stories one reads about this being the norm in other countries, are more fantasy and wistful longing. Many of the notions people in the US have about countries like France often come from stories, many decades into the telling, of experiences that occurred during the two world wars, of being exposed to minor differences in cultural attitudes and customs arising not only from differences in national mores and attitudes, but also from young American soldiers, often from a rural setting and very young, being exposed to more sophisticated urban customs.
And the stories grow with the years until minor differences such as for instance a general acceptance of public urination or legal prostitution, morph into far larger and diffuse imaginings that expand into many spheres of everyday life.
This same sort of cultural imagining occurred during the late 19th century, early 20th, when artists and painters and writers in western countries, conjured up a set of largely imagined ideas and attitudes towards the cultures of the Mid East. They were thought to be far more exotic and sensual than they really were in actual everyday life, Still, it did not prevent a largely fantasy world of the (often sexual) imagination from coming into existence. These ideas are enticing and pleasurable to contemplate, but seldom do they reflect reality with any great accuracy.