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This paper studies child health in India focusing on differences in anthropometric outcomes between the three main religions – Hindus, Muslims and Christians. The results indicate that Christian infants have higher height-for-age z-scores as compared to infants of other religious identities, and that this is especially true for infant girls in states with a relatively large Christian presence. We instrument for Christian identity today using data on the location of Protestant and Christian missions, the incidence of epidemic diseases and natural disasters, and political crises (wars) that mission establishing countries were engaged in during India's colonial history. The results are robust to a series of checks for instrument validity and omitted variables, and indicate that by inculcating awareness and spreading knowledge on sanitation and the scientific underpinnings of disease, the advent of Christianity has long-term health implications for India's children today.

We are the first to examine the effect of Superfund cleanups on infant health rather than focusing on proximity to a site. We study singleton births to mothers residing within 5km of a Superfund site between 1989–2003 in five large states. Our "difference in differences" approach compares birth outcomes before and after a site clean-up for mothers who live within 2,000 meters of the site and those who live between 2,000–5,000 meters of a site. We find that proximity to a Superfund site before cleanup is associated with a 20 to 25% increase in the risk of congenital anomalies.

Although there is considerable support for the influence of maternal attachment on children's development (see Gerhardt, 2015), this is one of the first studies to examine the effects of maternal prenatal reports of attachment representations with close others on reports of infants' health. Mothers (N = 483) completed surveys to assess attachment and depression in the second or third trimester of pregnancy, infants' health over the first 6 months, and depression and infant temperament when infants were 6 months old. We found that insecure mothers, as compared to secure mothers, were more likely to report that their infants experienced colic and illnesses associated with immune, cardiovascular, and respiratory systems. It may be that secure mothers experience less anxiety associated with parenting and, as expected, were consistently found to report lower levels of infant illness symptoms. Alternatively, secure mothers would be expected to provide more consistent and responsive care compared to insecure mothers, which may also influence their infants' physical health (see also Gerhardt, 2015). Future research needs to further explore this finding — do secure mothers simply perceive their infants to be healthier due to their own low anxiety or are infants of secure mothers healthier due to consistent and responsive care received?

In recent decades, several states have enacted their own immigration enforcement policies. This reflects substantial variation in the social environments faced by immigrants and native-born citizens, and has raised concerns about unintended consequences. E-Verify mandates, which require employers to use an electronic system to ascertain legal status as a pre-requisite for employment, are a common example of this trend. Drawing on birth certificate data from 2007-2014, during which 21 states enacted E-Verify mandates, we find that these mandates are associated with a decline in birthweight and gestational age for infants born to immigrant mothers with demographic profiles matching the undocumented population in their state as well as for infants of native-born mothers. In observing negative trends for both immigrants and natives, our findings do not support the hypothesis that E-Verify has a distinct impact on immigrant health; however, the broader economic, political, and demographic contexts that coincide with these policies, which likely impact the broader community of both immigrants and natives, may pose risks to infant health.

Section 1. Current status of newborn infants and perinatal health in South Asia. ch. 1. Current state of the health of newborn infants in developing countries / Anthony Costello and Dharma Manandhar -- ch. 2. Recent trends in perinatal health in South Asia -- Section 2. Social, economic and cultural aspects of motherhood in South Asia. ch. 3. Social and developmental issues affecting the perinatal health of mothers and their infants / Hilary Standing and Anthony Costello -- ch. 4. Epidemiological trends in nutritional status of children and women in India / Harshpal Sachdev -- ch. 5. Women's work and maternal-child health: anthropological views on intervention / Catherine Panter-Brick -- ch. 6. Perinatal mortality in Nepal: implications for behaviour modification / Shyam Thapa -- ch. 7. Traditional and cultural aspects of neonatal care in developing countries / Shashi N.Vani -- Section 3. Cost-effective essential newborn care in poor communities: the evidence-base. ch. 8. Effective interventions in pregnancy to improve foetal growth / Amali Lokugamage and Charles H. Rodeck -- ch. 9. Hypothermia: epidemiology and prevention / Ragnar Tunell -- ch. 10. New methods for monitoring neonatal hypothermia and cold stress / Anthony Costello -- ch. 11. Birth asphyxia in developing countries: epidemiology, sequelae and prevention / Matthew Ellis -- ch. 12. Effective resuscitation / Siddarth Ramji -- ch. 13. Effective interventions to reduce neonatal mortality and morbidity from perinatal infection / Zulfiqar Ahmed Bhutta -- ch. 14. The importance of breastfeeding and strategies to sustain high breastfeeding rates / M. Q-K. Talukder -- ch. 15. Neonatal hypoglycaemia / Anthony Costello and Deb Pal -- ch. 16. Neonatal hyperbilirubinaemia in developing countries / Therese Hesketh -- ch. 17. Low birth weight newborns - the risks in infancy and beyond / Dipak K. Guha -- ch. 18. Does health education improve newborn care? / Alison Bolam, Dominique Tillen and Anthony Costello -- ch. 19. Community based strategies to improve newborn and infant care practices / Fehmida Jalil -- Section 4. Improving health service delivery. ch. 20. Special care of newborn at the district hospital / Dharma Manandhar -- ch. 21. Current controversies and recommendations for the care of high risk newborn infants / Meharban Singh -- ch. 22. Audit - a tool to improve the quality of perinatal care / Sophie Mancey-Jones -- ch. 23. Trained traditional birth attendants and essential newborn care in South Asia / Marta J. Levitt-Dayal -- ch. 24. TBA training: cost-effective? / Carole Presern -- ch. 25. What to do about referral and transfers of high risk mothers and newborns? / Daljit Singh -- ch. 26. Making perinatal services more user-friendly / Susan F. Murray -- ch. 27. How to improve information, education and communication for better newborn care -- Section 5. Challenges for future policy implementation and research. ch. 28. Challenges for future policy implementation and research / Anthony Costello and Sophie Mancey-Jones.

AbstractTransit buses are an integral part of urban life. They reduce externalities generated from private vehicles and increase geographic mobility. However, unlike most private vehicles in the United States, they use diesel fuel and emit higher amounts of toxic pollutants. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency set emission standards for transit buses starting in 1988 that have been continually updated, but their public health and economic impacts are unclear due to scarce emissions data. I construct a novel panel dataset for the New York City (NYC) Transit bus fleet between 1990 and 2009 and examine the impact of bus pollution on infant health by using bus vintage as a proxy for emissions. I exploit the variation in vintage as older buses are retired and replaced with newer, lower‐emitting buses forced to adhere to stricter emission standards. I then assign maternal exposure to bus vintage at the census block level. Findings suggest that maternal exposure to the oldest, unregulated buses is associated with modest reductions in birth weight and gestational age relative to newer buses that abide by emissions policies. I then conduct a back‐of‐the‐envelope cost‐benefit calculation and find net economic benefits of $53.3 million resulting from improved emission standards for the 2009 birth cohort in NYC. Since the treatment in this study clearly maps to federal emissions policies, these results are the first to provide credible evidence that transit bus emission standards had a positive effect on infant health.