Water, sanitation, and hygiene for child health: some evidence in support of public intervention in the Philippines

Joseph Capuno, Carlos Antonio Tan, Jr. and Xylee Javier
Additional contact information
Carlos Antonio Tan, Jr.: University of the Philippines School of Economics
Xylee Javier: University of the Philippines School of Economics

Philippine Review of Economics, 2016, vol. 53, issue 2, 1-27

Abstract: As in many developing countries, diarrheal diseases remain a top cause of child mortality and morbidity in the Philippines. Partly to address this problem, the government has undertaken programs to expand or promote access to safe water and sanitation facilities, especially among poor households. To assess the possible impact of such interventions on child health, we apply the propensity score matching technique on the pooled data from the last five rounds of the National Demographic and Health Survey. We find that improved water and improved sanitation each reduced the probability of child diarrhea in 1993-2008 by around two percentage points. In 2013, improved water reduced the probability by about 7 percentage points. On the other hand, improved sanitation does not seem to have a statistically significant effect. These results lend support to the government’s programs to widen access to safe water and sanitation facilities as measures to improve child health.

Keywords: Water and sanitation; child health; Philippines (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I12 I18 O53 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://pre.econ.upd.edu.ph/index.php/pre/article/view/940/859 (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:phs:prejrn:v:53:y:2016:i:2:p:1-27

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Philippine Review of Economics from University of the Philippines School of Economics and Philippine Economic Society Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by HR Rabe ().