Preventing Dengue through Mobile Phones: Evidence from a Field Experiment in Peru

Type Journal Article - Journal of health economics
Title Preventing Dengue through Mobile Phones: Evidence from a Field Experiment in Peru
Author(s)
Volume 35
Publication (Day/Month/Year) 2014
Page numbers 147-161
URL http://www.webmeets.com/files/papers/LACEA-LAMES/2012/576/dengue_LACEA.pdf
Abstract
Dengue is the most rapidly spreading mosquito-borne viral disease in the world (WHO 2009). In the last two decades, the dramatic rise in the number of dengue infections has been particularly noticeable in Latin American and the Caribbean countries. This paper examines experimental evidence of the effectiveness of mobile phone technologies in improving households’ health preventive behavior in dengue-endemic areas. The main results suggest that exposure to repeated health information encourages households’ uptake of preventive measures against dengue. As a result, the Breteau Index in treatment households, an objective measure of dengue infestation, is 0.316 standard deviations below the mean of the control group. Moreover, we use a multiple treatment framework that randomly assigns households to one of four treatment groups in order to analyze the impacts of framing on health behavior. Main results show that households exposed to non-monetary loss messages experienced a higher increase in almost all outcomes relative to other types of messages. Furthermore, the largest impacts were concentrated among the poorest households and households living in localities with high incidence of dengue.

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