IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ehl/lserod/90297.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Richer, wiser and in better health? The socioeconomic gradient in hypertension prevalence, unawareness and control in South Africa

Author

Listed:
  • Thomas, Ranjeeta
  • Burger, Ronelle
  • Hauck, Katharina

Abstract

The socioeconomic gradient in chronic conditions is clear in the poorest and wealthiest of countries, but extant evidence on this relationship in low- and middle-income countries is inconclusive. We use data gathered between 2008 and 2012 from a nationally representative sample of over 10,000 South African adults, and objective health measures to analyse the differential effects of education, income and other factors on the prevalence of hypertension, individuals' awareness and control of hypertensive status. Prevalence of hypertension is high at 38% among women and 34% among men. 59% of hypertensive individuals are unaware of their status. We find prevalence and unawareness of hypertension are a public health concern across all income groups in South Africa. Higher income is however associated with effective control amongst men. Completing secondary education is associated with 7 mmHg lower blood pressure only in a small sub-group of women but is associated with 22 percentage point higher likelihood of effective hypertension control amongst women. We conclude that poorer and less educated individuals are particularly at high risk of cardiovascular disease in South Africa.

Suggested Citation

  • Thomas, Ranjeeta & Burger, Ronelle & Hauck, Katharina, 2018. "Richer, wiser and in better health? The socioeconomic gradient in hypertension prevalence, unawareness and control in South Africa," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 90297, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    • Handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:90297
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/90297/
    File Function: Open access version.
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lei, Xiaoyan & Yin, Nina & Zhao, Yaohui, 2012. "Socioeconomic status and chronic diseases: The case of hypertension in China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 23(1), pages 105-121.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Bonsang, Eric & Caroli, Eve & Garrouste, Clémentine, 2021. "Gender heterogeneity in self-reported hypertension," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 43(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Jason R. D. Rarick & Carly Tubbs Dolan & Wen‐Jui Han & Jun Wen, 2018. "Relations Between Socioeconomic Status, Subjective Social Status, and Health in Shanghai, China," Social Science Quarterly, Southwestern Social Science Association, vol. 99(1), pages 390-405, March.
    2. Yunyun Jiang & Haitao Zheng & Tianhao Zhao, 2019. "Socioeconomic Status and Morbidity Rate Inequality in China: Based on NHSS and CHARLS Data," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 16(2), pages 1-19, January.
    3. Qin, Xuezheng & Pan, Jay & Liu, Gordon G., 2014. "Does participating in health insurance benefit the migrant workers in China? An empirical investigation," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 30(C), pages 263-278.
    4. Lei, Xiaoyan & Song, Guangxiang & Su, Xuejuan, 2021. "Information, Belief, and Health Behavior: Evidence from China," Working Papers 2021-9, University of Alberta, Department of Economics.
    5. Peng Nie & Alfonso Sousa-Poza & Jianhong Xue, 2016. "Fuel for Life: Domestic Cooking Fuels and Women’s Health in Rural China," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 13(8), pages 1-22, August.
    6. Pan, Tianxin & Palmer, Michael, 2018. "Risk factors and non-communicable disease diagnosis in China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 72-84.
    7. Thomas, Ranjeeta & Burger, Ronelle & Hauck, Katharina, 2018. "Richer, wiser and in better health? The socioeconomic gradient in hypertension prevalence, unawareness and control in South Africa," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 217(C), pages 18-30.
    8. Peng Nie & Andrew E. Clarck & Conchita D'Ambrosio & Lanlin Ding, 2020. "Income-related health inequality in urban China (1991-2015): The role of homeownership and housing conditions," Working Papers 524, ECINEQ, Society for the Study of Economic Inequality.
    9. Chee‐Ruey Hsieh & Xuezheng Qin, 2018. "Depression hurts, depression costs: The medical spending attributable to depression and depressive symptoms in China," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 27(3), pages 525-544, March.
    10. Yangyang Sun & Daxin Dong & Yulian Ding, 2021. "The Impact of Dietary Knowledge on Health: Evidence from the China Health and Nutrition Survey," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(7), pages 1-17, April.
    11. Nie, Peng & Otterbach, Steffen & Sousa-Poza, Alfonso, 2015. "Long work hours and health in China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 33(C), pages 212-229.
    12. Laurene Petitfour & Xiezhe Huangfu & Martine Audibert & Jacky Mathonnat, 2015. "Estimating and explaining the efficiency of township hospitals in Shandong province in the context of the drug policy reform," CERDI Working papers halshs-01180621, HAL.
    13. Qiufeng Gao & Lanxi Peng & Wenbin Min & Jingchun Nie & Aiqin Wang & Yaojiang Shi & Haonan Shi & Dirk E. Teuwen & Hongmei Yi, 2020. "Regularity of Clinical Visits and Medication Adherence of Patients with Hypertension or Diabetes in Rural Yunnan Province of China," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(24), pages 1-13, December.
    14. PAN, Jay & QIN, Xuezheng & LIU, Gordon G., 2013. "The impact of body size on urban employment: Evidence from China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 27(C), pages 249-263.
    15. Yiwei Chen & Hui Ding & Min Yu & Jieming Zhong & Ruying Hu & Xiangyu Chen & Chunmei Wang & Kaixu Xie & Karen Eggleston, 2019. "The Effects of Primary Care Chronic-Disease Management in Rural China," NBER Working Papers 26100, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    16. Yu, Yangyang & Sloan, Frank A., 2017. "Trends in elderly health by cohort: Evidence from China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 282-295.
    17. Yi Liao & Stuart Gilmour & Kenji Shibuya, 2016. "Health Insurance Coverage and Hypertension Control in China: Results from the China Health and Nutrition Survey," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 11(3), pages 1-14, March.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    South Africa; hypertension; socioeconomic gradient; unawareness; control;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • N0 - Economic History - - General

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:90297. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: LSERO Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/lsepsuk.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.