Long-term effects of universal health insurance in developing countries: evidence from mexico - project title long-term effects of universal health insurance in developing countries: evidence from…

This $156,000 Project Grant award from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (CFDA 93.865 - Child Health and Human Development Extramural Research) will fund a research project at the University of Colorado-Denver to study the long-term effects of Mexico's universal public health insurance program, Seguro Popular, on child health and household outcomes. The project will leverage the longitudinal, nationally representative Mexican Family Life Survey to identify the causal impacts of Seguro Popular on child height, a key indicator of well-being, as well as its dynamic effects over time on household expenditures, labor market participation, investment, risk, and migration. The findings will provide critical evidence on the persistent impacts of expanding health insurance access in a developing country context. The project will be conducted from August 2024 through July 2026.

Long-term effects of universal health insurance in developing countries: evidence from mexico - project title long-term effects of universal health insurance in developing countries: evidence from mexico project summary/abstract (30 lines of text) the implementation of government programs to increase access to health insurance has rapidly increased in developing countries in the last three decades. However, evidence on their long-term effects in a developing country is limited and provides mixed conclusions. Understanding the persistent impact of universal health insurance is particularly relevant as the hypothetical health improvements and reduced financial burden they may offer have the potential to shrink intergenerational transmission of poverty and improve social mobility of beneficiaries and their children. The efficacy of these programs remains unclear predominantly because of a lack of random variation in their implementation and the fact that in randomized controlled trials, control groups typically receive the benefits, at most, only a few years after the initial implementation. Long-term evaluation of these programs is further complicated by the substantial challenges of consistently tracking and following up baseline respondents, which can lead to bias-inducing, non-random attrition. This project contributes to filling the GAP in what is understood about the broad consequences of increased access to health insurance in developing countries. Specifically, we provide new evidence from a population- representative sample on the long-term effects of seguro popular, a universal public health insurance program introduced in mexico in 2002. Pairing the richness and innovative design of the mexican family life survey (mxfls), a nationally representative, longitudinal survey with cutting-edge and rigorous non- experimental methods, represents a unique opportunity to make a substantial contribution to understanding the persistent impact of programs that increase access to health insurance in developing countries. The mxfls collects comprehensive respondent data across time whereby every respondent surveyed in mexico at baseline in 2002, and any of their children born after 2002, are target respondents for follow-up survey waves, including those who are domestic or international migrants. By integrating the mxfls's ability to track economic and health outcomes of respondents over multiple years with the temporal and spatial variation created by seguro popular's rollout, as well as, the biological variation generated by the age individuals are first exposed to the program, this project will: 1) identify the causal effects of seguro popular on child height, which has been causally associated with indicators of well-being in later life, e.g., educational attainment, earnings, adult health, and mortality; 2) explore the dynamic impact across time of this health insurance policy to provide new insights into how supply and demand side constraints at the time of program implementation can alter its effectiveness; and 3) provide evidence on the impact of seguro popular on household expenditure, labor market, investment, risk, and migration behavior. In so doing, the project will have provided scientific evidence on the extent to which the provision of health insurance in a developing country setting improves the lifelong health and wellbeing of its population.