The link between the mortality and epidemiological transitions is used to identify the effect of the former on the fertility transition: a mortality transition that is not accompanied by improving morbidity causes slower demographic and economic change. In a model where children may die from...

type="main" <p>Child mortality rates have fallen substantially in developing countries since 1960. The expected fertility decline has followed only weakly in sub-Saharan Africa compared to other recent and historic demographic transitions. Disease and anthropometric data suggest that morbidity...</p>

We provide a new explanation for sub-Saharan Africa’s slow demographic and economic change. In a model where children die from infectious disease, childhood health affects human capital and noninfectious-disease related adult mortality. When child mortality falls from lower prevalence, as in...