Why Were Infant and Child Mortality Rates Highest in the Poorest States of Peninsular Malaysia, 1941-75?

by Christine E. Peterson, Khairuddin Yusof, Julie DaVanzo, Jean-Pierre Habicht

Download

Download eBook for Free

FormatFile SizeNotes
PDF file 2.1 MB

Use Adobe Acrobat Reader version 10 or higher for the best experience.

Purchase

Purchase Print Copy

 FormatList Price Price
Add to Cart Paperback56 pages $23.00 $18.40 20% Web Discount

From 1941 through 1975, infant and child mortality rates were higher in the poorest states than in the other states of Peninsular Malaysia. This Note investigates possible reasons for those higher rates, using household-level data that document infant and child mortality and their correlates. The results indicate that the higher average infant mortality rate (IMR) in the four poorest states over the 1941-1975 period can be explained by such factors as poorer sanitation and the lesser incidence of hospital births. However, the major factor is the difference in ethnic composition between the two regions — Chinese in Malaysia having a far lower IMR than Malays, and there being a smaller proportion of Chinese in the four states studied.

This report is part of the RAND Corporation Note series. The note was a product of the RAND Corporation from 1979 to 1993 that reported other outputs of sponsored research for general distribution.

This document and trademark(s) contained herein are protected by law. This representation of RAND intellectual property is provided for noncommercial use only. Unauthorized posting of this publication online is prohibited; linking directly to this product page is encouraged. Permission is required from RAND to reproduce, or reuse in another form, any of its research documents for commercial purposes. For information on reprint and reuse permissions, please visit www.rand.org/pubs/permissions.

The RAND Corporation is a nonprofit institution that helps improve policy and decisionmaking through research and analysis. RAND's publications do not necessarily reflect the opinions of its research clients and sponsors.