The impact of global climate change on health is not well understood. Besides the direct channel of increasing temperatures, there is a potentially more harmful one: through an increase in extreme weather incidents. We offer the first evidence on the effect of natural disasters on pregnancy...

Nineteenth century white US statures varied with nutrition, disease exposure, and the physical environment. An additional explanation for stature growth is vitamin D production. Vitamin D is produced internally by the synthesis of cholesterol and sunlight in the epidermis. However, studies that...

Trends in BMI values are estimated by centiles of the US adult population by birth cohorts 1886-1986 stratified by ethnicity. The highest centile increased by some 18 to 22 units in the course of the century while the lowest ones increased by merely 1 to 3 units. Hence, the BMI distribution...

Background: The trend in the BMI values of the US population has not been estimated accurately because time series data are unavailable and because the focus has been on calculating period effects. Object: To estimate the trend and rate of change of BMI values by birth cohorts stratified by...

Little research has been done on the body mass index values of 19th century US African-Americans and whites. This paper uses 19th century US prison records to demonstrate that although modern BMIs have increased in the 20th century, 19th century black and white BMIs were distributed...

We estimate and decompose family income-related inequality in child health in the US and analyze its dynamics using the income-related health mobility index recently introduced by Allanson et al., 2010. Data come from the 1997, 2002, and 2007 waves of the Child Development Supplement (CDS) of...

Between 1960 and 1997, life expectancy at birth of Americans increased approximately 10% G from 69.7 to 76.5 years G and it has been estimated that the value of life extension during this period nearly equaled the gains in tangible consumption. While life expectancy has tended to increase, there...

When traditional methods for measuring economic welfare are scarce or unreliable, heights and BMIs are now well accepted measurements that represent biological conditions during economic development. Weight, after controlling for height, is an alternative measure to BMI for current net...

Heights and body mass index values (BMIs) are now well accepted measures that reflect net nutrition during economic development and institutional change. This study uses 19th century weights instead of BMIs to measure factors associated with current net nutrition. Across the weight distribution...

The public health care systems in the Nordic countries provide high quality care almost free of charge to all citizens. However, social inequalities in health persist. Previous research has, for example, documented substantial educational inequalities in cancer survival. We investigate to what...