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Eradicating adult disease: human capital, labor supply, and fertility in Brazil
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We estimate the long-run economic effects of eliminating Chagas disease, a chronic adult-onset tropical disease, using Brazil’s national vector-control campaign launched in 1975. Combining newly digitized local seroprevalence data with census microdata from 1970 to 2010, we exploit variation in baseline prevalence and cohort-specific exposure in a continuous-intensity difference-in-differences design. We first validate the empirical strategy by showing that areas with higher pre-campaign prevalence experienced larger subsequent declines in Chagas-related adult mortality. The main effects are concentrated in rural areas, where the disease burden was historically highest. In rural areas, Chagas eradication increased educational attainment, raised labor-force participation for both men and women, and generated positive effects on income with distinct cohort patterns across gender. Fertility declined for rural women, especially on the extensive margin. Effects in urban areas are weaker and more mixed, consistent with the historical concentration of vectorial transmission in rural dwellings. These findings show that controlling an adult-onset disease can generate long-run effects on education, labor-market outcomes, and fertility through improvements in expected adult health and survival.