Beyond poverty as a proxy: reducing inequality in infant mortality by identifying and targeting higher risk births

Author:

Ramos Antonio P.,Hazlett Chad,Smith Stephen

Abstract

AbstractInfant mortality remains high and uneven in much of sub-Saharan Africa. Given finite resources, reducing premature mortality requires effective tools to identifying left-behind populations at greatest risk. While countries routinely use income- or poverty-based thresholds to target policies, we examine whether models that consider other factors can substantially improve our ability to target policies to higher-risk births. Using machine learning methods, and 25 commonly available variables that can be observed prior to birth, we construct child-level risk scores for births in 22 sub-Saharan African countries. We find that targeting based on poverty, proxied by income, is only slightly better than random targeting, with the poorest 10 percent of the population experiencing approximately 10 percent of total infant mortality burden. By contrast the 10 percent of the population at highest risk according to our model accounts for 15-30% of infants deaths, depending on country. A hypothetical intervention that can be administered to 10% of the population and prevents just 5% of the deaths that would otherwise occur, for example, would save roughly 841,000 lives if targeted to the poorest decile, but over 1.6 million if targeted using our approach.

Publisher

Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory

Reference24 articles.

1. Akresh, R. , de Walque, D. , and Kazianga, H. (2015). Alternative cash transfer delivery mechanism: Impacts on routine preventive health clinic visits in burkina faso. working paper series 17785, National Bureau of Economic Research.

2. Improving immunisation coverage in rural India: clustered randomised controlled evaluation of immunisation campaigns with and without incentives

3. Basset, L. (2008). Can conditional cash transfer programs play a greater role in reducing child undernutrition? Technical report, World Bank.

4. Changes in Child Mortality Over Time Across the Wealth Gradient in Less-Developed Countries

5. Are centers for disease control and prevention guidelines for preexposure prophylaxis specific enough? formulation of a personalized hiv risk score for pre-exposure prophylaxis initiation;Sexually Transmitted Diseases,2017

Cited by 1 articles. 订阅此论文施引文献 订阅此论文施引文献,注册后可以免费订阅5篇论文的施引文献,订阅后可以查看论文全部施引文献

同舟云学术

1.学者识别学者识别

2.学术分析学术分析

3.人才评估人才评估

"同舟云学术"是以全球学者为主线,采集、加工和组织学术论文而形成的新型学术文献查询和分析系统,可以对全球学者进行文献检索和人才价值评估。用户可以通过关注某些学科领域的顶尖人物而持续追踪该领域的学科进展和研究前沿。经过近期的数据扩容,当前同舟云学术共收录了国内外主流学术期刊6万余种,收集的期刊论文及会议论文总量共计约1.5亿篇,并以每天添加12000余篇中外论文的速度递增。我们也可以为用户提供个性化、定制化的学者数据。欢迎来电咨询!咨询电话:010-8811{复制后删除}0370

www.globalauthorid.com

TOP

Copyright © 2019-2024 北京同舟云网络信息技术有限公司
京公网安备11010802033243号  京ICP备18003416号-3