The establishment of the UK National Health Service (NHS) in July 1948 was one of the most consequential health policy interventions of the twentieth century, providing universal and free access to medical care and substantially expanding maternal and infant health services. In this paper, we...

The establishment of the UK National Health Service (NHS) in July 1948 was one of the most consequential health policy interventions of the twentieth century, providing universal and free access to medical care and substantially expanding maternal and infant health services. In this paper, we...

Education levels in Burkina Faso, especially among women, remain low despite efforts made by government authorities and development partners to implement priority area 4 of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). This situation presents difficulties for women in terms of their being...

This paper uses U.S. TRI data on industrial air lead emissions to provide IV estimates of the effects of air lead concentration on infant mortality. The causal effect of lead on infant mortality is identified by variation in air fugitive lead emissions interacted with wind speed near reporting...

This paper uses the implementation of a privately funded family planning program in Colorado to demonstrate that expanding access to long-acting reversible contraceptives to lower income women creates positive selection in the health of the children being born, reducing the rates of extremely...

This paper documents an important unintended consequence of expanding contraceptive access; namely that it creates positive selection in the health of the children being born. I use a family planning intervention which gave thousands of long-acting reversible contraceptives to reproductive-age...

We examine the human development consequences of transferring responsibility for public service provision to local governments in India, using state-level variation in the timing of administrative decentralization reforms. We find that devolution of the responsibility for health functions from...

Immunisation during pregnancy is a vital strategy to protect infants from infectious diseases in their first months of life. Drawing on administrative data from New Zealand, I analyse the relationship between birth order, maternal vaccination against pertussis and influenza, and subsequent...

Using data from the only large-scale randomized controlled trial promoting prolonged exclusive breastfeeding, we study how the intervention affected child health and why. The intervention increased weight-for-age in infancy, with effects persisting through adolescence. We show that treated...

The establishment of the UK National Health Service (NHS) in July 1948 was one of the most consequential health policy interventions of the twentieth century, providing universal and free access to medical care and substantially expanding maternal and infant health services. In this paper, we...

We present a comprehensive evaluation of the health impacts of the introduction and expansion of a large non-contributory health insurance program in Mexico, the Seguro Popular (SP). SP provided access to health services without co-pays to individuals with no Social Security protection. We...

A recently growing literature evaluates the influence of early-life conditions on life-cycle health and mortality. This paper extends this literature by estimating the associations between birth-state infant mortality rates experienced during early-life (as a proxy for general disease...

While several studies have examined the effect of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) on economic development indicators, most of these studies focused on economic growth with very little attention paid to health outcomes. Moreover, among the studies that took account of health outcomes, none of...

Beyond the usual macroeconomic stability, which is a necessity for economic growth, more focus should be placed on the effects that environmental quality has on infant mortality in sub‑Saharan Africa. Africa has always had the highest rate of infant mortality and the poorest environmental...

This paper uses U.S. TRI data on industrial air lead emissions to provide IV estimates of the e?ects of air lead concentration on infant mortality. The causal e?ect of lead on infant mortality is identified by variation in air fugitive lead emissions interacted with wind speed near reporting...

Education levels in Burkina Faso, especially among women, remain low despite efforts made by government authorities and development partners to implement priority area 4 of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). This situation presents difficulties for women in terms of their being...

India consistently ranks among the countries with the highest levels of ambient air pollution worldwide. At the same time, it faces significant challenges in neonatal health, with newborns having low average birth weights and a high incidence of being born within the low birth weight (LBW) and...

I evaluate the impact of abortion policies in sub-Saharan Africa to understand the potential consequences of a reduced international support for women's rights following the overturn of Roe v. Wade. I find that decriminalizing abortion reduces fertility through two complementary channels. For...