scholarly journals Mortality level and trend in South Africa and their Implications

2021 ◽  
pp. 53-62
Author(s):  
K. A. KYEI ◽  
P. GAVHI

Mortality is a critical measure of population’s health and public health systems. Infant mortality, for example, indicates quality of life, accessibility to primary healthcare and the overall health status of a country. Reduction in infant mortality shows improvement in the health status. No credible information about mortality in South Africa because the two previous censuses’ data from Statistics South Africa (StatsSA) were not reliable, this study makes attempt to bridge the gap in the lack of knowledge. Th is study uses South African General Household Survey (SAGHS) data, to fi nd the level and trend of mortality and their implications. Data for the years, 2012, 2013 and 2015, have been used. Demographic and statistical methods, including an evaluation of data quality using UN joint score, and construction of model life tables. The results indicated that the infant mortality rate (IMR) was 43 per 1000 in 2012, 36 per 1000 in 2013 and 21 per 1000 in 2015. Th is study further indicated that the general health status of South African population improved marginally from 2012 to 2015 because the life expectancy in creas ed by 7 years for the males, and by 8 years for females, between those years. The study results that SAGHS data are reliable, mortality is decreasing with increasing life expectancy. The study recommends that more proactive measures need to be put in place to improve the health status of the population, especially the children because the IMR is still quite high and creates concerns.

2021 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Natalia Shartova ◽  
Vladimir Tikunov ◽  
Olga Chereshnya

Abstract Background The capacity for health comparisons, including the accurate comparison of indicators, is necessary for a comprehensive evaluation of well-being in places where people live. An important issue is the assessment of within-country heterogeneity for geographically extensive countries. The aim of this study was to assess the spatial and temporal changes in health status in Russia and to compare these regional changes with global trends. Methods The index, which considers the infant mortality rate and the male and female life expectancy at birth, was used for this purpose. Homogeneous territorial groups were identified using principal component analysis and multivariate ranking procedures. Trend analysis of individual indicators included in the index was also performed to assess the changes over the past 20 years (1990–2017). Results The study indicated a trend towards convergence in health indicators worldwide, which is largely due to changes in infant mortality. It also revealed that the trend of increasing life expectancy in many regions of Russia is not statistically significant. Significant interregional heterogeneity of health status in Russia was identified according to the application of typological ranking. The regions were characterized by similar index values until the mid-1990s. Conclusions The strong spatial inequality in health of population was found in Russia. While many regions of Russia were comparable to the countries in the high-income group in terms of GDP, the progress in health was less pronounced. Perhaps this can be explained by intraregional inequality, expressed by significant fluctuations in income levels. Trial registration Not applicable.


2020 ◽  
pp. 097674792096340
Author(s):  
Avinash Kaur

This article attempts to examine the causal linkage among government health expenditure, health status and economic growth in India for the period from 1981–1982 to 2015–2016. The results of Johansen co-integration test indicate that government health expenditure, health status and economic growth have long-run relationship in India. The results of Toda–Yamamoto causality test showed that there existed unidirectional causal relationship running from government health expenditure to gross domestic product—GDP (economic growth); GDP (economic growth) to life expectancy; government health expenditure to infant mortality rate and infant mortality rate to life expectancy. On the other hand, there is no evidence showing causality in any direction between infant mortality rate to GDP (economic growth) and government health expenditure to life expectancy. The study strongly confirmed that the government health expenditure has an effect on GDP (economic growth) and infant mortality rate (which depicts health status) in India. The health outcomes, namely life expectancy and infant mortality rare, reveal unidirectional causality between them. Therefore, the study concludes that policymakers and the government should pay proper attention to the health sector in order to ultimately achieve economic growth in the country.


2021 ◽  
Vol 110 ◽  
pp. 02006
Author(s):  
Ludmila Borisova ◽  
Galina Zhukova ◽  
Anna Kuznetsova ◽  
Julie Martin

The paper analyzes the socio-economic and demographic indicators of life expectancy in the countries of the world. Methods of regression analysis and machine learning are used. Statistically significant indicators that affect life expectancy around the world have been identified. When analyzing the data using machine learning methods, 13 of the 14 analyzed indicators were statistically significant. Significant indicators, in addition to those selected in the regression analysis, were 3: the under-five infant mortality rate (per 1,000 live births), the Net Barter Terms of Trade Index (2000 = 100), and Imports of goods and services (in % of GDP) (in the regression analysis, only the infant death rate was significant). In addition, it should be noted that there is a significant decrease in the under-five infant mortality rate (per 1,000 live births) for the EU, CIS and South-East Asian countries compared to the border set in the study for all countries: 4.65 vs. 34.9, a decrease in the birth rate from 2.785 to 1.85, a sharp increase in exports of goods and services: from 23.17 to 80.59, a halving in imports of goods and services, a drop in population growth from 2.105 to 0.85. The performed statistical analysis strongly supports the use of machine learning methods in identifying statistically significant relationships between various indicators that characterize the development of countries, if there are gaps in the data.


1994 ◽  
Vol 33 (4II) ◽  
pp. 745-758 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rehana Siddiqui ◽  
Mir Annice Mahmood

An analysis of health status is an important aspect of human resource development. Improvements in health do not only improve the productivity of the labour force, but they also help to improve the impact of other forms of human capital formation, e.g. education. In most developing countries health status is difficult to determine as the question arises as to what measures should be used as indicators of health status. At a general level most of the demand or production function considerations are obtained by aggregating over the micro factors. I However, in the case of health status micro and macro measures may not be perfectly correlated; In most cross-country studies life expectancy at birth or the infant mortality rate are taken as indicators of health status. Other measures which can be used to indicate such improvements in health status are age and diseasespecifrc mortality or morbidity and life expectancy. However, the improvement in health status can be observed most obviously from increases in life expectancy which is a better measure for cross country comparison than age and diseasespecific mortality or morbidity, which are more difficult to compare at the international level.


2014 ◽  
Vol 6 (8) ◽  
pp. 682-689 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dorah Dubihlela

This paper identifies the main features of a shopping mall that govern customer satisfaction in Southern Gauteng in South Africa. Literature is reviewed, identifying various features in shopping malls such as merchandisers, accessibility, service, amenities, ambiance, entertainment, security and among others. This literature is based on previous authors' scientific work, on mall features that influence the satisfaction and patronage by customers. A quantitative study was conducted with 429 questionnaires used in the final data analysis. The study results suggest the important shopping mall features in Gauteng South in South African and confirm that specific shopping mall features are positively related to customer satisfaction and mall patronage. The paper further develops suggestions on mall features that should be emphasised for promotional campaigns, customer satisfaction and mall patronage by customers.


Author(s):  
Anies Yulinda W ◽  
Trias Novia L. ◽  
Melati Tegarina ◽  
Nur Chamidah

Life expectancy can be used to evaluate the government's performance for improving the welfare of the population in the health sector. Life expectancy is closely related to infant mortality rate. Theoretically, decreasing of infant mortality rate will cause increasing of life expectancy. A statistical method that can be used to model life expectancy is nonparametric regression model based on least square spline estimator. This method provides high flexibility to accommodate pattern of data by using smoothing technique. The best estimated model is order one spline model with one knot based on minimum generalized cross validation (GCV) value of 0.607. Each increasing of one infant mortality rate unit will cause decreasing of life expectancy of  0.2314 for infant mortality rate less than 27, and of  0.0666 for infant mortality rate more than and equals to 27. In addition, based on mean square error (MSE) of 0.492 and R2value of 76.59% for nonparametric model approach compared with MSE of 0.634 and R2 value of 71.8%  for parametric model approach, we conclude that the use of nonparametric model approach based on least square spline estimator is better than that of parametric model approach.


2017 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yuichiro Kakutani

By using an incentives/disincentives model to map the divergent behaviors of multinational corporations (MNCs) confronted by a sanctioned economy, I explain why some economic sanctions work better than others at achieving their desired political outcomes. When presented with the opportunity to “run the blockade,” MNCs are incentivized to sanction bust by the allure of higher profit through rent extraction. At the same time, MNCs are disincentivized to sanction bust by the penalties for breaking the sanction, but only if MNCs believe sanction busting operations is inconspicuous enough to avoid detection. If the incentives to sanction bust outweigh the disincentives not to, then MNCs will trade with sanctioned states, as was the case with Rhodesia. Since MNCs were crucial to both the Rhodesian and the South African economies—as it provided oil to the former and operated a significant minority of the firms in the latter—the decisions of MNCs to remain engaged in Rhodesia and to disengage from South Africa had a significant impact on the economic and political life of the two apartheid regimes. Hence, while many economic and political indicators identified by literature predicted that Rhodesia would have a shorter life expectancy under economic sanctions, Rhodesia defied all expectations and survived twice as long as South Africa.


2013 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ikechukwu O. Ezeuduji

Orientation: Identification of tourists’ needs and finding ways of satisfying them is crucial to any tourism destination.Research purpose: This paper investigated the challenges, demands and expectations of Nigerian tourists to South Africa.Motivation for the study: Nigeria, along with other African nations, has been identified as one of the core regional source markets with air links to South Africa. Increasing revenue generated from regional tourism is important to South African Tourism.Research design, approach and method: Descriptive statistics and Chi-square tests were used to analyse the data collected using a questionnaire survey of 320 Nigerian tourists to South Africa.Main findings: Results showed that Nigerian tourists visit South Africa mostly for the purposes of business, holiday, visiting friends and relatives, education and medical care. Challenges perceived by these Nigerian tourists visiting South Africa include long waiting time for the visa process in Nigeria, expensive cost of living in South Africa, safety and security problems, not so many airlines to choose from and expensive flight costs. Nigerian tourists mostly expect South Africans to be friendlier and have expectations of linking up with new business partners or performing transactions. They also have a strong demand for shopping, leisure and quality education.Practical/managerial implications: This study recommends a bilateral tourism relationship agreement between the Nigerian and South African governments to ameliorate the visa process; targeted marketing communications by South African Tourism toward Nigerian tourists based on study results; strong police presence and proper policing in South Africa; air transport liberalisation and low-cost carriers implementation for shared economic growth within the African region.Contribution/value-add: No former research has specifically identified Nigerian tourists’ challenges, expectations and demands whilst visiting South Africa.


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