The Lasting Legacy of Seasonal Influenza: In-Utero Exposure and Labor Market Outcomes

Hannes Schwandt

No 10589, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: Pregnancy conditions have been shown to matter for later economic success, but many threats to fetal development that have been identified are difficult to prevent. In this paper I study seasonal influenza, a preventable illness that comes around every year and causes strong inflammatory responses in pregnant women. Using administrative data from Denmark, I identify the effects of maternal influenza on the exposed offspring via sibling comparison, exploiting both society-wide influenza spread and information on individual mothers who suffer strong infections during pregnancy. In the short term, maternal influenza leads to a doubling of prematurity and low birth weight, by triggering premature labor among women infected in the third trimester. Following exposed offspring into young adulthood, I observe a 9% earnings reduction and a 35% increase in welfare dependence. These long-term effects are strongest for influenza infections during the second trimester and they are partly explained by a decline in educational attainment, pointing to cognitive impairment. This effect pattern suggests that maternal influenza damages the fetus through multiple mechanisms, and much of the damage may not be visible at birth. Taken together, these results provide evidence that strong infections during pregnancy are an often overlooked prenatal threat with long-term consequences.

Keywords: pregnancy conditions; seasonal influenza; labor market outcomes (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I10 J13 J24 J3 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 76 pages
Date: 2017-02
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-hea and nep-lma
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (21)

Downloads: (external link)
https://docs.iza.org/dp10589.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: The Lasting Legacy of Seasonal Influenza: In-Utero Exposure and Labor Market Outcomes (2018)
Working Paper: The Lasting Legacy of Seasonal Influenza: In-utero Exposure and Labor Market Outcomes (2017)
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:iza:izadps:dp10589

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
IZA, Margard Ody, P.O. Box 7240, D-53072 Bonn, Germany

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA) IZA, P.O. Box 7240, D-53072 Bonn, Germany. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Holger Hinte ().