ABSTRACT
This chapter evaluates some of the principal linkages between rapid population growth, the quality of health (as measured by mortality), and the quality of health care. The review begins with an examination of the increasingly close cross-country association between the level of fertility and the level of mortality, together with a discussion of the various “common causes” of these two phenomena in multivariate analysis. The chapter assesses the evidence for causal connections between health and reproduction at the level of individual behaviour and outcomes. The chapter discusses briefly on the macro-level or sectoral linkages between health and population. The possibility that the “quality of health” exerts an influence on the fertility ideals and reproductive behaviour of individual couples has long been recognized. Effective primary health care policies oriented towards the infectious diseases of infancy and childhood offer some promise of increasing the quality of health in populations with high fertility and mortality.
