Drinking Water Salinity and Infant Mortality in Coastal Bangladesh

Abstract

This paper investigates the post-natal impact of pre-natal salinity exposure in coastal Bangladesh, drawing on extensive medical research that links the salinity of drinking water consumed during pregnancy to maternal hypertension, preeclampsia and post-partum infant morbidity and mortality. The research employs individual and household survey information from the Bangladesh Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) for 2004 and 2007. In the absence of direct, household-specific measures of drinking water salinity, we construct monthly estimates for 2001–2009 using spatial interpolation of readings from soil salinity monitors that lie within 40[Formula: see text]km of the DHS clusters. The analysis uses probit and logit models to estimate mortality probability for infants less than two months old. Controlling for many other determinants of infant mortality, we find high significance for salinity exposure during the last month of pregnancy and no significance for exposure during the preceding months. The implied impact is comparable in magnitude to the estimated effects of traditionally-cited variables such as maternal age and education, gender of the household head, household wealth, toilet facilities, drinking water sources and cooking fuels.