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@ARTICLE{Mhlichen:277546,
author = {Mühlichen, Michael and Doblhammer, Gabriele},
title = {{S}ocial differences in cause-specific infant mortality at
the dawn of the demographic transition: {N}ew insights from
{G}erman church records.},
journal = {Population and environment},
volume = {47},
number = {1},
issn = {0146-1052},
address = {Dordrecht [u.a.]},
publisher = {Springer Science + Business Media B.V.},
reportid = {DZNE-2025-00435},
pages = {15},
year = {2025},
abstract = {Little is known about social gradients in cause-specific
infant mortality in the nineteenth century. To our
knowledge, this is the first paper to explore this
connection for the time prior to the epidemiologic and
demographic transitions. We used the church records of
Rostock, an important port city on the Baltic coast in
northern Germany, and prepared and merged the baptismal and
burial registers of its largest parish (St. Jakobi) for the
periods 1815-1836 and 1859-1882. Based on individual-level
data (N = 16,880), we classified the fathers' occupations
into three social classes and estimated cause-specific
infant mortality risks for these groups using event history
analysis. We found a clear social gradient in neonatal and
post-neonatal mortality. This gradient was driven by
waterborne diseases and convulsions, suggesting severe
nutritional and sanitation deficits among the lower social
classes even before the city began to struggle with
worsening living environments following industrialisation
and population growth in the second half of the nineteenth
century. Our results also suggest that deteriorating
environmental conditions affect all parts of the population,
leading to an increase of infant mortality rates in all
social classes. Improvements in nutritional and sanitary
conditions may thus reduce the risk of infant death from
infectious diseases.The online version contains
supplementary material available at
10.1007/s11111-025-00483-w.},
keywords = {Causes of death (Other) / Germany (Other) / Neonatal and
post-neonatal mortality (Other) / Nineteenth century (Other)
/ Seasonality (Other) / Social class (Other)},
cin = {AG Doblhammer},
ddc = {300},
cid = {I:(DE-2719)1012002},
pnm = {354 - Disease Prevention and Healthy Aging (POF4-354)},
pid = {G:(DE-HGF)POF4-354},
typ = {PUB:(DE-HGF)16},
pubmed = {pmid:40092059},
pmc = {pmc:PMC11906567},
doi = {10.1007/s11111-025-00483-w},
url = {https://pub.dzne.de/record/277546},
}