Malaria ecology, child mortality & fertility

- We use the ecology of malaria transmission to study child mortality and fertility.
- Years with pernicious malaria conditions lead to higher fertility rates.
- We use ecology as an IV to estimate child mortality effects on fertility.
- Findings suggest child mortality has a causal effect on fertility changes.

The broad determinants of fertility are thought to be reasonably well identified by demographers, though the detailed quantitative drivers of fertility levels and changes are less well understood. This paper uses a novel ecological index of malaria transmission to study the effect of child mortality on fertility. We find that temporal variation in the ecology of the disease is well-correlated to mortality, and pernicious malaria conditions lead to higher fertility rates. We then argue that most of this effect occurs through child mortality, and estimate the effect of child mortality changes on fertility. Our findings add to the literature on disease and fertility, and contribute to the suggestive evidence that child mortality reductions have a causal effect on fertility changes.