Abstract
This study exploits the introduction of high subsidies for anti-malaria products in Senegal in 2009 to investigate whether malaria prevents parents from investing in child health. A simple model of health investments under competing mortality risks predicts that private expenses to fight malaria and other diseases should increase in response to anti-malaria public interventions. We test and validate this prediction using original panel data from a household expenditure survey combined with geographical information on malaria prevalence. We find that health expenditures in malarious regions catch up with non-malarious regions. The same result holds for parental health-seeking behavior against other diseases like diarrhea. These patterns cannot be explained by differential trends between regions. Our results suggest that behavioral responses to anti-malaria campaigns magnify their impact on all-cause mortality for children.
Highlights
IntroductionIt was expensive to treat and ruined efforts to prevent other diseases
Malaria has long been the leading cause of child death in Sub-Saharan Africa
This paper investigates how private health investments have responded to subsidies for antimalaria products introduced in Senegal in the late 2000s
Summary
It was expensive to treat and ruined efforts to prevent other diseases. In this context, did malaria depress parental investment in child health? 900 millions of Insecticide-Treated Nets ( ITNs) have been distributed since the early 2000s. An estimated 2/3 of children sleep under an ITN against virtually none before the distribution started.. Free access to treatments called Artemisinin-based Combination Therapy ( ACT) has been promoted. The scope of this intervention is more modest with an estimated 16% of children being treated when sick in 2015, but the coverage is increasing rapidly (World Health Organization and others, 2015)
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