The Effect of Climate and Weather on Postneonatal Mortality, Northern Sweden 1861-1950

Göran Broström, CEDAR
Tommy Bengtsson , Lund University

To what extent does air temperature, directly, or indirectly via humidity, affect the survival of infants and to what extent does it depend on the resources of the family? To answer these questions, we use individual level data for Västerbotten, northern Sweden, 1861–1950 combined with temperature data from three weather stations in the area. As expected, newborns are particularly sensitive to low temperatures during the winter, far more than to high temperatures during the summer. As they grow older, and their body weight increase, they gradually become less vulnerable to cold weather. In fact, we find an almost perfect linear relationship between the temperatures in the previous eight weeks and postneonatal mortality. Surprisingly, children of different social classes suffer the same. This means that we find no evidence that insufficient indoor heating and crowding during the winter, which both are associated with social class, matters. Instead, the increase in postneonatal mortality during the winter, when the temperature and humidity fall, is likely due to a higher prevalence of contagious diseases in the society. While we find no variations due to social class, birth season matters. Finally, the effects of low temperature on postneonatal mortality decreases gradually over time.

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 Presented in Session 70. Flash Session New Data, Methods and Comparative Perspectives in Historical Demography