Back to browse results
The effects of female HIV/AIDS status on fertility and child health in Cambodia
Authors: Keisuke Okada
Source: Journal of Asian Economics, 23(5): 560-570, doi:10.1016/j.asieco.2012.06.005
Topic(s): Child health
Fertility
HIV/AIDS
Women's health
Country: Asia
  Cambodia
Published: JUN 2012
Abstract: Although Cambodia has been on a higher growth track, it still faces a great challenge in public health. Public health is closely related to the standard of living of the people and is indispensable for further economic development. This paper considers a serious public health problem, the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Cambodia. Specifically, it presents two testable hypotheses derived from a simple model and then empirically demonstrates these hypotheses, using data of more than 8000 women from the 2005 Cambodia Demographic and Health Survey (DHS). One hypothesis is the negative effect of female HIV on fertility, and the other is the positive effect of maternal HIV on child health status. Our estimation results are consistent with these hypotheses, implying that women infected with HIV tend to bear fewer children and their children are in better health.