The Effect of COVID-19 on Fertility in India: Evidence from the National Family Health Survey

Gby Atee (), Aparajita Dasgupta and Sneha Lamba ()
Additional contact information
Gby Atee: Ashoka University
Sneha Lamba: Ashoka University

No 115, Working Papers from Ashoka University, Department of Economics

Abstract: How fertility responds to the changes in the disease environment is an important question for understanding population dynamics. We investigate this question in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic in India. We leverage the intensity of the nationwide mobility restrictions in difference-in-differences and event study frameworks to estimate the impact of the pandemic on fertility in the country. To do this, we harmonise district-wise data on lockdown intensity with birth histories from the latest round of the National Family Health Survey 2019-2021 (NFHS-5). We find a 0.2 percentage point increase in the probability of births in the post-COVID period compared to the pre-COVID period — the effect starts at nine months after the first lockdown in India and tapers off ten months later. Strikingly, the rise in fertility is most prominent in states with higher fertility rates at the baseline and in districts which are likely to have high reverse migration during COVID. We also find that the increase in fertility occurred for the higher order births. In contrast, we find a decline in the probability of first order births in districts with most restrictions on mobility. We explore potential mechanisms and find a significant decrease in the use of modern contraceptives in the post-COVID period, which aligns with our main finding. Our results have important implications for understanding fertility behaviour and human capital investments in the face of shocks.

Keywords: COVID-19; Fertility; Healthcare; India; Shock (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 31
Date: 2024-07-09
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-hea
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://dp.ashoka.edu.in/ash/wpaper/paper115_0.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ash:wpaper:115

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Working Papers from Ashoka University, Department of Economics
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Ashoka University ().