Living longer: The effect of the Mexican conditional cash transfer program on elderly mortality

With both an aging population and a transition from communicable to chronic diseases, the health of the elderly is a growing issue in many developing countries. Conditional cash transfer programs are usually thought to benefit young people, but may also benefit other age groups since some programs require that all household members have regular preventive health check-ups. This paper exploits the phasing-in of the Mexican conditional cash transfer program, Progresa, between 1997 and 2000, and shows a 4% decline in average, municipality-level mortality for people aged 65 and older. The program not only reduced deaths due to more traditional infectious diseases, but also diabetes related deaths. Given that diabetes deaths are a leading cause of death in Mexico, and in the top 10 causes of death in many high- and middle-income countries, this is an important finding.