Malaria Survivors during Early Life, Health at Old Age, and Stroke Mortality in Costa Rica

Gilbert Brenes-Camacho, Universidad de Costa Rica
Alberto Palloni, University of Wisconsin at Madison

Current elderly people in developing countries were exposed to a deleterious health environment during their early years. In Costa Rica, 11% of people aged 60 and over in 2004 reported that they had malaria during their youth. There is evidence that malaria survivors might be more likely to have cerebro-vascular diseases (stroke) at adult ages. The aim of this article is to use the CRELES study (a study about aging in Costa Rica) to determine how different malaria survivors are compared to the rest of the Costa Rican elderly, and whether they are more likely to die due to a stroke, to cardiac diseases, or to other causes of death. We find that the prevalence of several morbidities is not significantly different between malaria survivors and the rest of the elderly population. Malaria survivors are more likely to die due to a stroke, but not due to other selected causes of death.