Page 57 - Azerbaijan State University of Economics

THE JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC SCIENCES: THEORY AND PRACTICE, V.78, # 2, 2021, pp. 43-62

Considering therefore, the IVPROBIT result, we observed that a marginal change in
drinking water supply will result to a corresponding increase in child health of 1.5
percent due to decrease in the number of diarrhea cases among children. This result
reveals that the source of drinking water supply is a strong determinant of child health
of age 0 to 59 months; this is consistent with the result obtained by the World Health
Organization.

They reported that almost one tenth of the global disease burden could be prevented
by improving water supply and management of water resources while in another
report they noted that 4 percent of all deaths and 5.7 percent of total disability-
adjusted life years can be attributed to water (Prudd-Ustun, 2008).

As seen above, Cheng et al (2012) added that, worldwide 1.4 million children die
each year from preventable diarrhea diseases and some 88 percent of diarrhea cases
are related to unsafe water. The other factors positively associated with child health
include: household size, urban household residence, while factors negatively
associated with child health include; mothers currently employed in the job market,
breast feeding children, fertility rate, mother attended prenatal services while
pregnant, literacy rate, child age in years, household size square and non -poor
parent. Our result reveals that the instrument used is strong and relevance and so
valid, following the weak identification test: Cragg-Donald F-Stat [5% maximal IV
relative bias] 416.961 [16.38] and the Sargan statistic (overidentification test of all
instruments): (Chi-sq(2) P-val): 0.000 [0.000], further, the Durbin-Wu-Hausman test
for exogeneity of variables in 7.455[0.0003] and wald test of exogeneity
4.57[0.0002] reveals that the problem of endogeneity is solve. The use of
instrumental variable in our study has greatly reduced the effect of any bias that
could have existed in our regression and so rendering our result robust.

5.3 Effect of access to portable water on child health by age distribution
Table 3 presents the result of household water source effects by child age in years
according to the IVPROBIT model as seen from above. We observed that water
supply does not affect children of 1 year except otherwise. Knowledge of absolute
breast feeding is widely vulgarized in Cameroon especially for the first six months
of delivery. This means that in the first months of child delivery, mothers absolutely
gives their children only breast mild they don’t have any contact with water apart
from bathing and watching the baby. In most cases the water used to bath the baby is
not only boiled but heavily treated to avoid any form of infection.

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