The demand for child curative care in two rural thanas of Bangladesh: effect of income and women's employment

This paper seeks to investigate the determinants of child health care seeki ng behaviours in rural Bangladesh. In particular, the effects of income, wo men's access to income, and the prices of obtaining child health care are e xamined. Data on the use of child curative care were collected in two rural areas of Bangladesh-Abhoynagar Thana of Jessore District and Mirsarai Than a of Chittagong District-in March 1997. In estimating the use of child cura tive care, the nested multinominal logit specification was used. The results of the analysis indicate that a woman's involvement in a credit union or income generation affected the likelihood that curative child car e was used. Household wealth decreased the likelihood that the child had an illness episode and affected the likelihood that curative child care was s ought. Among facility characteristics, travel time was statistically signif icant and was negatively associated with the use of a provider. Copyright ( C) 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.