Female Education Reduces Infant and Childhood Deaths

[NRSKarenRN, BSN, RN]

from scientific american:

female education reduces infant and childhood deaths

smarter maternal decisions prevent leading causes of mortality

[color=#0e774a]july 7, 2011

[color=#0e774a]mark fischetti

the single biggest factor, by far, in reducing the rate of death among children younger than five is greater education for women. in all countries worldwide, whether females increase schooling from 10 years to 11, say, or two years to three, infant mortality declines, according to a recent study by the institute for health metrics and evaluation at the university of washington

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attatched graph by continent, education level and child mortality looks pretty but hard to decipher. karen

baby's life, mother's schooling: scientific american

jun 15, 2011

child mortality rates decline as women become better educated

[color=#0e774a]mark fischetti

[color=#0e774a]

[color=#0e774a]

[color=#0e774a]for years health officials have thrown money at ways to prevent young children from dying, with little global data on effectiveness. recently a pattern has emerged: mortality drops in proportion to the years of schooling that women attain. the relation holds true for rich countries and poor, as seen above in each rising line. whether education rises from high levels (say, 10 years to 11) or low levels (from one year to two), child mortality drops (the lines get thinner). as a global average, education accounts for 51 percent of the decline in mortality--the biggest influence by far--according to a study by the institute for health metrics and evaluation. educated women, it seems, make wiser choices about hygiene, nutrition, immunization and contraception.

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[color=#0e774a]www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?...babys-life-mothers-schooling

[Turd Ferguson]

I have absolutely no idea what those graphs are trying to say.

Who in the world came up with that thing?

[NPinWCH]

I have absolutely no idea what those graphs are trying to say.

Who in the world came up with that thing?

Not the best graphs I agree, but years of schooling is on the vertical axis with 0 at the bottom and 15 yrs at the top and number of deaths to children under 5 is the horizontal axis. The thicker the line, the higher the number (also there's some odd color gradient they could have eliminated).

In most countries, as years of schooling increases, the number of child deaths decreases. It's not a good graphic, but there is a legend that explains it near the map.