The effect of maternal education on infant and child mortality in Kenya

Abstract

This study was aimed at establishing the effect of maternal education on infant and child mortality in Kenya at the national level. The study also aimed at examining the differentials of infant and child mortality by selected socio-economic, nuptial, and environmental factors. Furthermore, the study examined the differentials of infant and child mortality by maternal education for the high and low infant and child mortality provinces namely, Nyanza and Central provinces respectively. The investigation involved the use of both indirect techniques of estimation and logistic regression analysis. The data were drawn from the 1993 Kenya Oemograph ic and Health Survey and the study adopted the Mosley and Chen (1984) framework for the study of child survival in developing countries. The results obtained indicated that infant and child mortality rates for Kenya at the national level were 67 and 40 per 1,000 live births respectively and the life expectancy at birth was found to be 58 years. Besides, differentials by maternal education at the national level and for the two provinces were observed indicating that.there is a general decline of infant and child mortality rates with the rise of mothers educational levels with secondary and above education the decline being substantial. Of all the socio-economic, nuptial and environmental factors incorporated in the logistic regression model, maternal education emerged as one of the most significant determinants of child survival in Kenya. Thus, the operational hypothesis that, maternal education is inversely related to infant and child mortality was confirmed in this analysis. Paternal education was found to be equally important for child survival in Kenya. Other non education variables like women who are not able to read. marital status of women who were married and living together, sources of drinking water from ponds, lakes and rain water, women who were divorced, widowed and not living together, sources of drinking water from rivers, wells and streams were found to have a significant positive association with under five mortality compared to their respective references. Primary education of mothers and fathers, flush toilet and urban place of residence are among those variables included in the multivariate logistic regression model which were found to be not significantly related to under five mortality when compared with their reference categories. This study suggests that, the role of paternal education on infant and child mortality should not be oversimplified as paternal education was also found to be a key determinant of infant and child mortality in Kenya. Therefore, future studies should aim at the reasons why maternal and paternal education affect mortality risks in infancy and childhood and which of the reasons are important in a particular setting along with investigating the mechanisms through which maternal and paternal education operate to affect child survival in Kenya.