The disease environment, schooling, and development outcomes: Evidence from Ethiopia

The disease environment could help explain underdevelopment in Africa. This paper shows that local malaria risk is associated with worse local development outcomes. Combining an Ethiopian household survey with satellite-derived topographical information, the paper shows that malaria incidence is correlated with village elevation, slope, and their interaction. That is, malaria is sensitive to elevation in flatlands, where the habitat is suitable for mosquito breeding, but not in steeper lands. Using topography as a predictor of the disease environment, education levels are found to be negatively correlated with malaria. I find suggestive evidence that some other outcomes are related to malaria risk. Finally, the performance of topography predictors is assessed against other climate-based predictors of malaria.