  Matsumoto and Yoshimura have recently argued that the number density of heavy
particles in a thermal bath is not necessarily Boltzmann-suppressed for T << M,
as power law corrections may emerge at higher orders in perturbation theory.
This fact might have important implications on the determination of WIMP relic
densities. On the other hand, the definition of number densities in a
interacting theory is not a straightforward procedure. It usually requires
renormalization of composite operators and operator mixing, which obscure the
physical interpretation of the computed thermal average. We propose a new
definition for the thermal average of a composite operator, which does not
require any new renormalization counterterm and is thus free from such
ambiguities. Applying this definition to the model of Matsumoto and Yoshimura
we find that it gives number densities which are Boltzmann-suppressed at any
order in perturbation theory. We discuss also heavy particles which are
unstable already at T=0, showing that power law corrections do in general
emerge in this case.
