Sergiy Radyakin

Month of Birth and Children's Health in India

The authors use data from three waves of the India National Family Health Survey to explore the relationship between the month of birth and the health outcomes of young children in India. They find that children born during the monsoon months have lower anthropometric scores compared with children born during the fall and winter months. The authors propose and test four hypotheses that could explain such a correlation. The results emphasize the importance of seasonal variations in affecting environmental conditions at the time of birth and determining the health outcomes of young children in India. Policy interventions that affect these conditions could effectively impact the health and achievement of these children, in a manner similar to nutrition and micronutrient supplementation programs.

Tall Claims : Mortality Selection and the Height of Children in India

Data from three rounds of nationally representative health surveys in India (1992/93, 1998/99 and 2005/06) are used to assess the impact of selective mortality on childrens anthropometrics. The nutritional status of the child population was simulated under the counterfactual scenario that all children who died in the first three years of life were alive at the time of measurement. The simulations demonstrate that the difference in anthropometrics due to selective mortality would be large only if there were very large differences in anthropometrics between the children who died and those who survived. Differences of this size are not substantiated by the research on the degree of association between mortality and malnutrition. The study shows that although mortality risk is higher among malnourished children, selective mortality has only a minor impact on the measured nutritional status of children stratified by gender.

Generating and Interpreting Output Tables and Graphs

This chapter provides detailed descriptions of the ADePT Edu output. It also presents the formulas for calculating the various indicators and explains how to interpret the indicators. ADePT Edu produces two types of tables, which appear as formatted Excel spreadsheets.1 Output information tables include tables of contents, lists of errors and warnings, and variable settings. Indicator tables provide information on school participation, school progression, school attainment, education expenditures, and labor market outcomes (table 4.1). Indicators are disaggregated by the following characteristics:

Tall Claims: Mortality Selection and the Height of Children

Data from three rounds of nationally representative health surveys in India are used to assess the impact of selective mortality on children’s anthropometrics. The nutritional status of the child population was simulated under the counterfactual scenario that all children who died in the first three years of life were alive at the time of measurement. The simulations demonstrate that the difference in anthropometrics due to selective mortality would be large only if there were very large differences in anthropometrics between the children who died and those who survived. Differences of this size are not substantiated by the research on the degree of association between mortality and malnutrition. The study shows that although mortality risk is higher among malnourished children, selective mortality has only a minor impact on the measured nutritional status of children or on that status distinguished by gender.