Human resources and health outcomes: cross-country econometric study.

BACKGROUND: Only a few studies have investigated the link between human resources for health and health outcomes, and they arrive at different conclusions. We tested the strength and significance of density of human resources for health with improved methods and a new WHO dataset. METHODS: We did cross-country multiple regression analyses with maternal mortality rate, infant mortality rate, and under-five mortality rate as dependent variables. Aggregate density of human resources for health was an independent variable in one set of regressions; doctor and nurse densities separately were used in another set. We controlled for the effects of income, female adult literacy, and absolute income poverty. FINDINGS: Density of human resources for health is significant in accounting for maternal mortality rate, infant mortality rate, and under-five mortality rate (with elasticities ranging from -0.474 to -0.212, all p values