Conditionality and Health Outcomes

Abstract

Abstract Apart from any impact of International Monetary Fund (IMF) conditionality on government health spending, scholars increasingly pay attention to the effect of broader public policies on the social determinants of health. In this context, market-oriented policies promoted by the IMF have long been argued to harm health outcomes, but systematic examinations on how these reforms impact population health remain limited. This chapter evaluates statistically the impact of IMF conditionality on a universal health coverage index and on neonatal mortality rates. It finds that IMF structural reforms—that is, policy conditions targeting fundamental changes in policy environment—adversely impact both proxies for health outcomes. The key drivers of these effects were conditions mandating SOE privatization, labor market deregulation, and trade liberalization. Additional analyses on the impact of these reforms on 23 health-related Sustainable Development Goal health targets and indicators revealed that 12 of these were negatively affected.