Socio-economic determinants of efficiency in reducing child mortality in developing countries

Efficiency issues in health investments have received increasing attention, mainly as a result of the growing amount of resources invested in developing countries and their mixed impacts on outcomes. The empirical literature has suggested that, although government spending on health care improves the health status of the population, society can potentially gain more through the more efficient assignment of health resources. In this context, this paper aims to: firstly, to analyse whether developing countries can further reduce child mortality by using the available resources more parsimoniously; and secondly, to identify the (non-discretionary) socio-economic factors that could be affecting this process. More specifically, this paper aims to explain why some countries are more efficient than others in converting inputs (physician density and relative total health expenditure) into a health outcome: the under-five mortality rate (U5MR). The database used in the estimations comprised 47 developing countries with data for the periods 2000- 2004, 2005-2009, and 2010-2012. The findings suggest that greater efficiency in the provision of immunization, better quality government, and lower income inequality are directly related to efficiency in the use of inputs to reduce the U5MR.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech

Do Illicit Financial Flows Hurt Basic Healthcare Provision? The Case of Infant Vaccination Coverage in Low-and Middle-Income Countries

Since 1980, developing countries have lost US$16.3 trillion dollars through broad leakages in the balance of payments, trade misinvoicing, and unrecorded financial transfers. Moreover, according to the Global Financial Integrity (GFI), illicit flows from the developing world increased steadily to reach US$1.1 trillion in 2013. The amounts of resource losses due to illicit outflows entail severe social costs and show that the extent of illicit capital flows from developing countries is serious cause for concern. Indeed, illicit capital flow from developing countries exceeds the combined total of official development assistance (ODA) and foreign direct investment (FDI) flowing into those economies and is considered a major hindrance to development. Capital flight, and in particular illicit financial flows, drains the scarce public resources available to finance the provision of public services (e.g., basic health interventions such as immunisation programs) in the poorest countries. Thus, this article analysed the impact of illicit financial flows on the infant immunisation coverage rate as a first step in analysing the impact of illicit capital flows on life conditions in developing countries. With this aim, we employed data for 56 low- and middle-income countries for the period 2002-2013. The main result of the empirical analysis is that, as expected, the relative level of illicit financial flows negatively impacts vaccination coverage in the sample of countries considered. Specifically, the total effect of a year increase of 1 p.p. in the ratio of IFF to total trade is to reduce the level of vaccination coverage rate over the coming years by 0.1 p.p. Taking into account that the average number of infants in the countries analysed over the sample period was approximately 65.3 million, this result suggests that at least 65,300 children may not receive this basic health care intervention in the future as a consequence of the increase in the ratio of IFF to total trade in a particular year.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech

Caracterización sísmica de sitio en la zona del Distrito II de la Ciudad de Managua

Lós efectós de lós terremótós sóbre las cónstrucciónes existentes en un lugar són el resultadó directó de las caracterí sticas geóló gicas lócales. Lós dan ós causadós pór lós terremótós dependen de la fuerza, el periódó, la duració n de lós mismós y de la vulnerabilidad de lós elementós expuestós. Estós para metrós esta n fuertemente influenciadós pór las própiedades del sueló en la zóna, lós cuales a su vez dependen de las caracterí sticas tópógra ficas y geóte cnicas existentes. Las mediciónes de vibraciónes ambientales ó ruidó ambiental tienen el pótencial de cóntribuir significativamente a la mitigació n de amenaza sí smica, y au n ma s en a reas urbanas. Existe un me tódó pra cticó utilizandó micrótremóres para un mismó sitió, própuestó pór Nógóshi Nakamura en Japó n en 1989. Cónsiste en registró de ruidó ambiental causadó pór el medió natural e inclusó de móvimientós sí smicós y se calcula el cóciente espectral de la cómpónente hórizóntal y vertical del móvimientó. Los registros usados en este estudio pertenecen al distrito II de la ciudad de Managua, Managua. Un total de 78 registros de ruido ambiental (microtremores) seleccionados de los 208 puntos obtenidos, distribuidos a cada 200 m, del estudio que realiza INETER en el cual colaboramos en su obtención y que con su autorización utilizamos en este trabajo monográfico. Estos puntos presentaron los requisitos para aplicar el método. Es importante mencionar que los registros de ruido ambiental en su totalidad fueron colectados con un acelerógrafo K2 fabricado por Kinemetrics.inc y un registrador digital con sensor de 3 componentes o ETNA también fabricado por kinemetrics.inc. Los registros se tomaron con duraciones variantes entre 3 y 12 minutos completos. Para el cálculo de modelos de velocidad de corte se estiman con la frecuencia natural del suelo, dato importante obtenido mediante los microtremores, a partir del uso de modelos de referencia que sirvieron para obtener las velocidades cortantes en los sitios donde no hay o no existe un modelo específico disponible. De esta manera se obtuvo modelos de velocidades nuevos que surgieron de un ajuste de la repuesta teórica de un modelo de suelo ejemplar y la curva de H/V de nuestro lugar de estudio. Y se estimaron los espectros de respuesta usando el método lineal equivalente, el cual se contrastará con la envolvente para el tipo de suelo requerido según el Reglamento Nacional de la Construcción (RNC)

Nuevos datos sobre "Myxomycetes" presentes en la provincia de Granada (España)

En el presente trabajo se aportan nuevos datos sobre el conocimiento de los Myxomycetes de Granada (sur de España), citándose catorce nuevas especies, entre las que ne destacan: Comatricha alta Preusz, Diderma trevelyanii (Grev.) Fr., Diderma umbilicatum Pers., Didymium bahiense Gottsberger, Didymium difforme (Pers.) S.F. Gray, Didymium trachysporum G. Lister, Lamproderma scintillans (Berk. & Br.) Morgan, Physarum contextum (Pers.) Pers., Physarum vernum Somm. y se amplía la corologia de varias especies ya citadas en anteriores trabajos. Se comenta la distribución en la Peninsula Ibérica, confeccionándose mapas de distribución de dichos tazones basados en cuadrícula UTM de 50 Km.This article shows a study on the Myxomycetes on the province of Granada (Spain). We have found fourteen new taxa for this province. Some of these are: Comatricha alta Preusz, Diderma trevelyanii(Gres.) Fr., Diderma umbilicatum Pers., Didymium bahiense Gottsberger, Didymium difforme (Pers.) S.F. Gray, Didymium trachysporum G. Lister, Lamproderma scintillans (Berk. & Br.) Morgan, Physarum contextum (Pers.) Pers., Physarum vernum Somm. Distribution maps are given. We also included new dates about the chorology another species

An empirical analysis of the efficiency in reducing child mortality (Millennium Development Goal 4)

The main aim of this article is to analyse, at the macro-level, why some countries are more efficient in converting inputs (physicians density and relative total health expenditure) into both a specific health-output (immunization against measles) and a health-outcome (under-five mortality rate). With this aim, a two-step Data Envelopment Analysis / Tobit analysis is applied on cross-section data for 43 developing countries in 2000, 2005 and 2010. Research findings suggest that countries with lower income inequality have achieved better efficiency levels in attaining health targets. Some other control variables are also shown to matter, including government effectiveness and the poverty gap ratio. Thus, enhancing the quality of institutions and reducing poverty are key factors which could promote efficiency in the use of resources employed in the production of basic health outputs, like children immunization programs. These two factors may explain, for example, why some developing countries are achieving higher rates of immunization against measles using the same health-input level in the period 2006-2010.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech

Impact of illicit financial flows on infant vaccination coverage in developing countries.

Objectives This paper analysed the impact of illicit financial flows (IFFs) on the infant immunisation coverage rate as a first step in analysing the social costs of IFFs in developing countries. Background The liberalization of capital flows is generally associated with prospects of higher growth. However, in developing countries, opening the capital account may also facilitate the flow of capital out of the country through illicit financial flows (IFFs). Since 1980, developing countries have lost US$16.3 trillion dollars through broad leakages in the balance of payments, trade misinvoicing, and unrecorded financial transfers. Moreover, according to the Global Financial Integrity (GFI), illicit flows from the developing world increased steadily to reach US$1.1 trillion in 2013. Given that IFFs drain the scarce public resources available to finance the provision of public goods and services, the extent of illicit capital flows from developing countries is serious cause for concern. Data/Methods Data for 56 low- and middle-income countries for the period 2002-2013 have been employed. All data are open access (from GFI, World Health Organization and World Bank). Also, in order to analyse the impact of the relative size of IFFs on child vaccination coverage, as a baseline specification, a dynamic panel data model has been employed. Results/Expected Results The main result of the empirical analysis is that, as expected, the relative level of illicit financial flows negatively impacts vaccination coverage in the sample of countries considered. Specifically, the total effect of a year increase of 1 p.p. in the ratio of IFF to total trade is to reduce the level of vaccination coverage rate over the coming years by 0.1 p.p. Taking into account that the average annual number of infants in the countries analysed, over the sample period, was approximately 65.3 million, this result suggests that at least 65,300 children may not receive this basic health care intervention in the future as a consequence of the increase in the ratio of IFF to total trade in a particular year. Policy Implications The findings of this study offered evidence showing that, in developing countries, the existence of both sufficiently strong and stable financial institutions and an efficient legal system might be crucial in order to prevent the long-run negative effects of capital flows on the health conditions of populations.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech

Study of Manifold Geometry using Multiscale Non-Negative Kernel Graphs

Modern machine learning systems are increasingly trained on large amounts of data embedded in high-dimensional spaces. Often this is done without analyzing the structure of the dataset. In this work, we propose a framework to study the geometric structure of the data. We make use of our recently introduced non-negative kernel (NNK) regression graphs to estimate the point density, intrinsic dimension, and the linearity of the data manifold (curvature). We further generalize the graph construction and geometric estimation to multiple scale by iteratively merging neighborhoods in the input data. Our experiments demonstrate the effectiveness of our proposed approach over other baselines in estimating the local geometry of the data manifolds on synthetic and real datasets

Illicit financial flows in low- and middle-income countries: A hindrance to human development.

Illicit financial flows (IFFs) are cross-border transfers of funds that are illegally earned, transferred, or utilized. Although it is widely recognised that these flows drain the scarce public resources available to finance the provision of public services and investments, there are few contributions on the effects of IFFs on human development. In this context, the main aim of this paper is to analyse empirically the relationship between IFFs and human development. This study used annual data for 56 low- and middle-income countries for the period 2002-2013 (provided by the UN’s Human Development Index (HDI), the World Bank, Transparency International, and Global Financial Integrity) and employed econometric methods to quantify the impact of the relative size of IFFs on the HDI. The main result was that the total effect of an annual 10 percentage point increase in the ratio of IFFs to total trade would imply a 20.2 point decrease in HDI level as a long run effect. Thus, research findings suggest the urgent need to reduce IFFs as part of development policy in these countries.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech

InstanceRank: Bringing order to datasets

In this paper we present InstanceRank, a ranking algorithm that reflects the relevance of the instances within a dataset. InstanceRank applies a similar solution to that used by PageRank, the web pages ranking algorithm in the Google search engine. We also present ISR, an instance selection technique that uses InstanceRank. This algorithm chooses the most representative instances from a learning database. Experiments show that ISR algorithm, with InstanceRank as ranking criteria, obtains similar results in accuracy to other instance reduction techniques, noticeably reducing the size of the instance set.Ministerio de Educación y Ciencia HUM2007-66607-C04-0