Please join the Environmental Change Initiative and Eck Institute for Global Health for an in-person seminar presented by Fidel Gonzalez, Professor of Economics, Sam Houston State University, and Santosh Kumar, Associate Professor of Development and Global Health Economics, University of Notre Dame. 

The title of their talk is "Prenatal Exposure to Temperature Variability and Birth Outcomes in Mexico."

RSVP is appreciated as sandwiches will be provided.

Abstract: Using 18 million observations from Mexico for the years 2008-2018, we examine the relationship between in-utero exposure to extreme weather on birth outcomes–the log of birth weight, incidence of low birth weight, and height. We exploit variation in fetal exposure to temperature shocks by a municipality by year by gender fixed effect and a quartic on the conception day of the year. Our results show that exposure to an additional hot day (> 30°C) and cold day (< 10°C) reduces birth weight by 0.005% and 0.02%, respectively, relative to an additional hot day in the reference bin of 15 to 20°C. The effects in the second and third trimesters were more pronounced than in the first trimester.

Bio: Fidel Gonzalez is a Professor in the Department of Economics and International Business at Sam Houston State University in Huntsville, Texas. He specializes in Health Economics, Environmental Economics and Applied Microeconomics. His research is at the intersection of different areas of reproductive, child, and maternal health; crime; temperature; housing economics; and environmental economics. Dr. Gonzalez holds a Ph.D. in Economics, a M.S. in Economics from The University of Texas at Austin and a B.S. in Economics from the National Autonomous University of Mexico. Before joining Sam Houston State University, he worked doing economic analysis at a mortgage bank in Mexico City and served as an external instructor at CIDE.

Bio: Santosh Kumar is an Associate Professor of Development and Global Health Economics in the Keough School of Global Affairs at the University of Notre Dame. He is an applied microeconomist whose research focuses on the economics of global health and economic development in low- and middle-income countries. His research examines the causal association between child and maternal health, human capital, and poverty. Kumar is currently working on research projects related to the effects of prenatal conditions on birth outcomes and human capital accumulation; effects of birth endowment, postnatal investments, and micronutrient deficiencies on human capital, and the effects of access to physical infrastructure and microfinance on human wellbeing.