The Impact of Government Health Expenditures on Child Mortality in Afghanistan During the Years (2002–2024)

Abstract

Child mortality is one of the major challenges within the human development index (HDI) framework, posing serious risks to the survival of children. Although the Government of Afghanistan and child-support organizations have implemented comprehensive programs and allocated financial resources to reduce child mortality, the child mortality rate in the country remains a subject of concern. The present study examines the impact of government expenditures on child mortality in Afghanistan during the period 2002–2024. This research employs the ordinary least squares (OLS) method. In the model used for this study, the child mortality rate (CMR) is considered a function of government per-capita health expenditures, per-capita gross domestic product, adult literacy rate, fertility rate, and urbanization rate. The findings of this study indicate that the effect of government health expenditures on child mortality in Afghanistan is negative and statistically significant. Specifically, an increase of one unit in per-capita government health expenditures leads to a decrease of 1.1217 units in the child mortality rate. Overall, the regression results show that several explanatory variables play an important role in explaining variations in the dependent variable. Among these variables, per-capita health expenditures, adult literacy rate, and urbanization rate have a negative and significant impact on the dependent variable. In contrast, the coefficients of women’s fertility rate and per-capita GDP are statistically insignificant; therefore, their definitive effects on the dependent variable cannot be asserted.