Hit where it hurts: Healthcare access and intimate partner violence

Cristina Bellés-Obrero (), Caoimhe T. Rice () and Judit Vall Castelló ()
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Cristina Bellés-Obrero: Universitat de Barcelona & IEB
Caoimhe T. Rice: University of York
Judit Vall Castelló: Universitat de Barcelona & IEB

No 2024/06, Working Papers from Institut d'Economia de Barcelona (IEB)

Abstract: This paper investigates the causal link between healthcare access and intimate partner violence (IPV) victims’ help-seeking behavior. Access to healthcare serves as a critical avenue for screening or detecting IPV. Doctors are legally mandated to report suspected criminal injuries to the authorities and can guide victims towards IPV support services. We exploit the 2012 reform in Spain that removed access to the public healthcare system for undocumented immigrants. We use court reports and protection order requests from the Judicial Branch of the Spanish government to perform a difference-in-differences approach, comparing the helpseeking behavior of foreign and Spanish women before and after the reform. We find that restricting healthcare access led to an immediate 12% decrease in IPV reporting and protection order applications among foreign women, particularly in regions with strict enforcement. Importantly, we show suggestive evidence that the reform did not change the underlying incidence of IPV but the results are driven by a reduction in injury reports from medical centers. Our findings are important given the increase in migration flows globally as well as for corrent debates on granting/limiting access to healthcare for marginalized groups.

Keywords: Healthcare Access; Intimate Partner Violence; Reporting; Undocumented Immigrants (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I10 I12 I14 I31 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 53 pages
Date: 2024
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-hea
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https://ieb.ub.edu/ca/publication/2024-06-it-where ... te-partner-violence/

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