Raj Investigates Link between Domestic Violence and Survival of Indian Girls

[MAITRI]

http://sph.bu.edu/insider/index.php/Recent-News/raj-investigates-link-between-domestic-violence-and-survival-of-indian-girls.html

he deaths of an estimated 1.8 million female children in India over
two decades are linked to domestic violence against their mothers, an
international team of researchers that includes Boston University
School of Public Health Professor Anita Raj has found.
In a study published in the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent
Medicine, Raj and colleagues examined thousands of births from 1985 to
2005 and found that spousal violence against wives increased the risk
of death among female children, but not male children, in both the
first year and the first five years of life.
"Infants and young children in India were found to suffer
significantly greater risk of death in families in which mothers had
experienced spousal violence from their husbands," the authors wrote.

"Furthermore, the effect of such gender-based violence was profoundly
gendered; infant girls and children bear a far greater share of the
mortality burden associated with IPV [intimate partner violence]."

The authors found that even after considering the birth of fewer girls
than boys in India, deaths of infant girls and young girls accounted
for an estimated 80 percent of all infant deaths and 75 percent of all
child deaths related to IPV. They said those percentages translated to
approximately 58, 021 infant girls and 89,264 young girls dying each
year from 1985 to 2005 -- or 1.8 million girl deaths in India across
the 20-year period studied.

The authors said the disparity appears to be linked directly to the
lower investment in female children, in areas such as nutrition and
medical care. Violence against wives may well be a "marker" for
multiple other forms of gender-based maltreatment and neglect of
girls, such as provision of less food, reduced attention to infection
prevention, and decreased investment in care for illness, the study
says.

The authors concluded that intimate partner violence against women
"should be considered an urgent priority within programs and policies
aimed at maximizing survival of children in India, particularly those
attempting to increase the survival of girls 5 years and younger."
Jay Silverman of the Harvard School of Public Health was lead author
of the study. Raj was senior author. Co-authors included Debbie M.
Cheng, professor of biostatistics at BUSPH. The study was jointly
researched by the Harvard School of Public Health, BUSPH, the Indian
Council of Medical Research and the National Institute for Research in
Reproductive Health in Mumbai.
In addition to the study, Raj recently authored a commentary for The
Lancet journal that examines gender equity and healthcare coverage in
India. She outlined issues of gender inequity that remain in India and
that impede the nation's public health and development, including
pregnancy at a young age and successive pregnancies, which cause high
rates of maternal morbidity and mortality in India.

Submitted by Lisa Chedekel
ched...@bu.edu