Uncovering the Effect of the HIV Epidemic on Fertility in Sub-Saharan Africa: The Case of Malawi

Abstract

In many Sub-Saharan countries the HIV epidemic has spread to over 10% of the working-age population, and is likely to affect economically relevant behaviour. We evaluate the impact of the HIV/AIDS epidemic on the reproductive behaviour for women in Malawi, allowing for a heterogeneous response depending on age and prior number of births. HIV/AIDS increases the probability that a young woman would give birth to her first child, while it decreases the probability to give birth of older women or of young women who have already given birth. The resulting change in the distribution of fertility across age-groups is likely to be more demographically and economically important than changes in the total number of children a woman gives birth to.