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How Has The Introduction Of Antiretroviral Therapy (Art) Affected The Dynamics Between Aids And Economic Growth In Sub-­Saharan Africa?, Jose R. Rubio

Economics Honors Projects

This paper quantifies the economic effect of the use of antiretroviral therapy as a frontline strategy to fight AIDS using data on 29 countries in Sub-­‐Saharan Africa. To this purpose, I use two-­‐stage least squares estimation defining both a health equation and an education and health capital-­‐augmented structural Solow growth equation. Through the introduction of antiretroviral therapy (ART) and HIV prevalence in the health equation, I indirectly link HIV and ART to economic growth. The results show that the HIV/AIDS epidemic reduces GDP per capita by 0.175% per marginal increase in HIV prevalence. ART increases GDP per capita by 0.048% …