Unravelling Belgium’s mortality transition: the Role of Diffusion (1851-1915)

Sylvie Gadeyne , Vrije Universiteit Brussel
Philippe Bocquier, UCLouvain
Isabelle Devos, Ghent University

This paper investigates the role of diffusion in Belgium’s mortality transition in 1851-1915, examining its influence on transition speed and inequalities. We hypothesize that, at the pre-transition stage, diffusion acted within a limited spatial range around each municipality, but then increased and spanned larger areas with urbanization and industrialisation. We use historical data on municipal-level mortality and various socioeconomic and cultural indicators spanning 65 years. We developed an original method to smooth observed crude death rates (CDRs) and population estimates, ensuring comparability across municipalities despite gap years and random variations due to small population size. We standardized these smoothed CDRs for age (for 5 large periods), generating standardized CDRs that reflect expected mortality for each year and municipality accounting for national mortality trends. Next, we model the Standard Mortality Ratio by socio-economic determinants, population size and density, literacy, cadastral income, and mortality levels in neighbouring municipalities. Preliminary results show a shift in the contribution of age to CDRs. The share of children’s mortality was constant and high before 1880, but declined thereafter, while the contribution of old-age mortality was rising. From 1900 onwards, the CDR was less sensitive to age. Our results indicate a reversal of the urban penalty. In 1851-1870, mortality was higher in more densely populated municipalities, but later it rose mainly in less densely and small municipalities. Also, the higher the percentage literate, the higher the reduction in mortality, but only from the end of the 19th century. Our final paper will include results on diffusion patterns.

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 Presented in Session 117. Flash Session - Changing Mortality Patterns over Time and Space