European Divergence and Convergence in Causes of Death

• Antragstellerin: Professorin Dr. Gabriele Doblhammer-Reiter
• Fachliche Zuordnung: Empirische Sozialforschung
• Förderung: Förderung von 2008 bis 2011
• Projektkennung: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Projektnummer 57853453

After World War Two, Eastern Europe, together with Southern Europe, quite rapidly caught up with the countries of Northern and Western Europe in their successful fight against infectious diseases, and life expectancies converged very strongly towards the higher level that was thought to be close to a biological maximum. However, from the mid 1960s, a rapid divergence was observed. The Communist countries seemed to plateau close to that supposed ma6 ximum while Western countries made spectacular progress in the field of cardiovascular diseases. In some Eastern countries life expectancy even fell down, especially among males.For many years, INED and MPIDR have undertaken research projects to both improve the insufficient knowledge of precise trends and patterns in mortality and causes of death and to better understand the reasons for such a divergence, through both empirical and theoretical studies. One of the basic objectives was first to reconstruct coherent time series of deaths by cause, despite the statistical disruptions caused by regular revisions in the classification of diseases and the heterogeneity of national coding practices.Three years ago, the collaboration between INED and MPIDR together with the University of Rostock was substantially enhanced thanks to a 3-year ANR-DFG project, EDICCOD, mainly devoted to that first major field of investigation. The new INDICCOD project will provide an opportunity not only to continue in that direction by extending the period studied and increasing the number of countries involved, but also to go deeper into the study of internal heterogeneity in terms of geographical variations and of socioeconomic and cultural differences.Step by step, all these empirical studies will provide valuable material to realize the final objective of the project, namely the production of syntheses to answer two complementary sets of questions:- To what extent do inter- and intra-national differences in mortality and cause-of-death trends fit the theory of divergence-convergence, and what are the reasons for the current East- West divergence?- How do health policies impact mortality and cause-of-death trends, and what inferences can be drawn in terms of proposals for improvement, especially in Eastern Europe.

• DFG-Verfahren: Sachbeihilfen
• Internationaler Bezug: Frankreich
• Beteiligte Personen: Dr. France Meslé; Dr. Vladimir M. Shkolnikov