The impacts of armed conflict on child health: Evidence from 56 developing countries
| Author | Kien Le,My Nguyen |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/00223433211066417 |
| Published date | 01 March 2023 |
| Date | 01 March 2023 |
| Subject Matter | Regular Articles |
The impacts of armed conflict
on child health: Evidence
from 56 developing countries
Kien Le
Faculty of Economics and Public Management, Ho Chi Minh City Open University
My Nguyen
Faculty of Economics and Public Management, Ho Chi Minh City Open University
Abstract
This article evaluates the extent to which armed conflicts influence early childhood health for 56 developing
countries over nearly 30 years. Exploiting both spatial and temporal variations in conflict exposure within a
difference-in-differences framework, the article uncovers detrimental ramifications of armed conflicts on the health
outcomes of children under five years old. Particularly, children exposed to armed conflicts have lower height-for-age,
weight-for-height, and weight-for-age z-scores by 0.08, 0.05, and 0.10 standard deviations, respectively. Taking the
average corresponding anthropometric z-scores of unexposed children as the benchmarks, exposure to armed con-
flicts makes children 6.6% shorter for their age, 11% thinner for their height, and 9% thinner for their age. Exposure
to armed conflicts further makes children 2.2, 0.8, and 2.6 percentage points more likely to be stunted, wasted, and
underweight, respectively (i.e. 7.3%, 7.9%, and 10.2% increases compared to the benchmark averages of those
unexposed to armed conflicts). In addition, the heterogeneity analyses suggest that children born to low-education
mothers, children from relatively poor households, and children living in rural areas tend to bear the larger health
setbacks. Given the long-lasting impacts of poor health in early childhood on adult outcomes, delivering nutrition
interventions to children in conflict zones is of utmost importance, and extra attention should be given to children of
disadvantaged backgrounds.
JEL codes: I10, I15, J13, O15
Keywords
anthropometry, armed conflicts, child heath, developing countries
Introduction
As the number of major armedconflicts has almost tripled
in the past ten years, battlefield related deaths have seen a
six-fold increase (von Einsiedel et al., 2017; Dupuy &
Rustad, 2018).In 2016, approximately 70–92%of deaths
induced by armed conflicts involved civilians (United
Nations, 2018). United Nations (2018) further empha-
size that armed conflicts lead to not only immediate civil-
ian deaths and injuries but also the destruction of critical
infrastructure and essential services. The estimated finan-
cial loss amounted to 14.3 trillion USD in 2016, which is
equivalent to 12.6% of global GDP.
In this article, we investigate the extent to which
armed conflicts influence the health outcomes of chil-
dren for 56 developing countries in the past three
decades (1990–2018). The contribution of our work
to the literature is threefold. First, we analyze the less
visible but critical cost of conflicts, while other studies
tend to focus on individuals with urgent humanitarian
needs (Bru
¨ck, Justino & Martin-Shields, 2017). Second,
instead of quantifying the impacts of interest for one
Corresponding author:
my.ngt@ou.edu.vn
Journal of Peace Research
2023, Vol. 60(2) 243–257
ªThe Author(s) 2022
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DOI: 10.1177/00223433211066417
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