Relationship among HIV/AIDS Prevalence, Human Capital, Good Governance, and Sustainable Development: Empirical Evidence from Sub-Saharan Africa

Husam Rjoub,Jamiu Adetola Odugbesan

doi:10.3390/su11051348

Abstract

: Sub-Saharan Africa is regarded as the region that accommodates about 75% of the world HIV/AIDS prevalence as of 2016. Research on the relationship between the epidemic and sustainable development is scant in this part of the world, as available literature is dominated by studies that focus on HIV and economic growth. Therefore, this study examines the relationship between sustainable development and HIV/AIDS prevalence, along with other determinants of sustainable development, such as good governance and human capital in 26 sub-Saharan Africa countries over a 27-year period from 1990—2016. The pooled mean group (PMG) estimator was employed for analysis after it was confirmed by the Hausman test for the estimation of the relationship among the variables. The results revealed a unidirectional long-run and significant relationship between HIV/AIDS prevalence and sustainable development, human capital and good governance, and human capital and sustainable development. Also, a bidirectional long-run relationship was found between good governance and HIV/AIDS prevalence. Estimation of subgroups provides a robustness check for our findings. Therefore, the paper gives new insight to the government of sub-Saharan Africa countries and major stakeholders about how to attain sustainable development in the region, while intensifying efforts on reducing HIV/AIDS prevalence, and at the same time ensuring effective good governance and human capital development.

Highlights

The prevalence of HIV/AIDS constitutes a hindrance to the advancement of human development and remains a major concern for researchers, stakeholders, and policymakers [1]
The impact of HIV/AIDS on human capital was empirically examined and the results showed that HIV/AIDS prevalence have a long-run impact on human capital [16,20]
Greater variation was observed in low-middle income countries (LMIC), which shows a standard deviation value of 32.81 compared to the group panel, upper-middle income countries (UMIC), and low income countries (LIC), which have 21.96, 13.75, and 11.49, respectively

Summary

Introduction

The prevalence of HIV/AIDS constitutes a hindrance to the advancement of human development and remains a major concern for researchers, stakeholders, and policymakers [1]. With reference to the report of Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS [2], it was estimated at the end of 2016 that 34.5 million adults globally have been infected with HIV/AIDS virus, while about one million died from AIDS-related diseases. About 25.73 million (almost 75% of the world HIV/AIDS prevalence) people were HIV/AIDS carrier in Africa, out of which 741,000 died as a result of AIDS-related illnesses. The HIV/AIDS epidemics remains one of the challenges facing Africa continent, as it is far more than a health issue, and still requires more efforts so as not to hinder the sustainable development of the region [3,4]. There are an important economic (poverty, inequality, etc.), social (health), and environmental (climate change) crises, which sometimes culminate into an epidemic and result in death [5,6]

Methods

Results

Conclusion