Female Genital Cutting and Child Mortality: Evidence from the 1999 Senegalese FGC Ban

Jorge Garcia Hombrados , London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE)

This study exploits across ethnic-group variation in exposure to a law that in January 1999 banned the practice of female genital cutting (FGC) in Senegal to investigate the causal link between FGC and child mortality. The analysis shows that girls from ethnic groups that were more affected by the law experienced also larger reductions in the probability of child mortality. The effect is particularly large among the urban sample and indistinguishable from 0 in rural areas. These results, robust to different falsification tests, document for the first time the causal link between FGC and child mortality.

See extended abstract

 Presented in Session 220. Determinants of Child Health and Mortality