Graduation Year

2020

Date of Submission

12-2019

Document Type

Open Access Senior Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelor of Arts

Department

Science and Management

Reader 1

Jeffrey Flory

Reader 2

Joel Mackey

Rights Information

2019 Rei Imada

Abstract

This study aims to provide insight on how availability of antimalarial drugs can help alleviate the economic burden of malaria. Much of the existing literature that looks into the effects of antimalarial drug availability focuses on the associated health benefits, but fails to draw a link to the economic benefits that may also be incurred. Using data from the 2015-2016 Tanzania Demographic and Health Survey and Malaria Indicator Survey, this study performs a series of multiple regressions to observe how increased availability of artemisinin-based combination therapies (ACTs), a front-line antimalarial drug in most African countries, affects likelihood of work absenteeism for women. Women living in village-clusters with higher availability of ACTs were found to have decreased likelihood of work absenteeism, with a 1% cluster-level increase in ACT availability leading to a 0.295 percentage point decrease in likelihood of absenteeism. Furthermore, ACT availability was found to have a greater effect on decreasing likelihood of absenteeism for women who were self-employed agricultural workers. A 1% cluster-level increase in ACT availability for these women would lead to a 0.5459 percentage point decrease in likelihood of absenteeism. By finding that ACTs have an effect of decreasing likelihood of absenteeism, this study confirms that ACTs can be used as a tool to both decrease the health and economic burdens of malaria. Additionally, identifying self-employed agricultural workers as a group that sees increased benefits of ACT availability can help inform policymakers on how scarce resources can best be allocated to see the most impact on alleviating the economic burden of malaria.

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