Health, Health Resources, and Socioeconomic Development: Levels and Trends 1950--1980 in Eighteen Asian Countries.

Abstract

This study, based on annual data about eighteen Asian countries from 1950 to 1980, examines the effects of levels and trends of socioeconomic development and health resources on health. Life expectancy at birth for the total population was chosen as the most useful indicator of health. Indicators of socioeconomic development included the industrial labor force as a percentage of the total labor force, the literacy rate, and real GNP per capita. Physicians, nurses, and hospital beds per 1000 people were selected as the measures of health resources. The sources for data were the publications of UNESCO, FAO, WHO, ILO, ESCAP, and the U.N. Statistical Office, supplemented by the World Bank data files. The dynamics of mortality decline were observed throughout the three decades. Results from longitudinal and cross-sectional analyses complemented each other. Multiple regression analyses were applied to explain the level and trend in life expectancy at birth. Levels of socioeconomic development and health resources explained variations in levels of life expectancy at birth across countries quite well. The ${\\rm R}\\sp2$s equaled 0.896, 0.774, and 0.889 for the three respective decades. However, variations in trends in life expectancy at birth were less well predicted by trends in these same measures; ${\\rm R}\\sp2$s declined and equaled 0.564 for the 1960s, and 0.125 for the 1970s. Levels of socioeconomic development related more strongly to the levels of life expectancy at birth than did levels of health resources over the three decades. However, for explaining variations in trends of life expectancy at birth, trends in socioeconomic development contributed more than trends in health resources in the 1950s, but in the two later decades, trends in health resources became dominant. Among all the predictors, literacy rate stood out as a very important factor in predicting the level and trend in life expectancy at birth. The channels through which education may influence health were discussed in detail. There was no strong evidence for a ten year lagged effect of socioeconomic development or health resources on the levels or the trends in life expectancy at birth.