Immurana Mustapha, Abdullahi Ibrahim, Norshie Kingsford, Kale Elvis Reindolf, Iddrisu Abdul-Aziz, Tsey Irene Honam, Acquah Evelyn, Dalaba Maxwell Ayindenaba
Institute of Health Research, University of Health and Allied Sciences, Ho, Volta Region, Ghana.
Department of Economics, Memorial University of Newfoundland, St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada.
Glob Health Epidemiol Genom. 2025 Jul 15;2025:4330365. doi: 10.1155/ghe3/4330365. eCollection 2025.
Breast cancer remains one of the major diseases affecting women in the world. Relative to high-income settings, women in low-income settings such as Africa are less likely to be diagnosed with breast cancer and are more likely to die when they are affected by the disease. Apart from the negative health consequences of breast cancer, it could also reduce the labour productivity (LP) of the affected persons, at both the micro- and macrolevels. Nonetheless, empirical evidence on LP effects of breast cancer are scant and mostly focused on the microlevel and, hence, do not provide broader insights into the productivity losses associated with the disease. This study, to the best of our knowledge, therefore, provides the first cross-country macrolevel empirical evidence of the effect of breast cancer (among women) on LP in Africa. The study uses data on 47 African countries spanning the period 1992-2021. Disability-Adjusted Life Years (DALYs) associated with breast cancer in women is used as the baseline measure of breast cancer, while Years Lived with Disability (YLDs) and deaths associated with the disease in women are used as robustness measures. The system Generalised Method of Moments (GMM) regression is used as the main estimation technique, while two other estimators are used for robustness purposes. Our analysis reveals a negative statistically significant association between breast cancer DALYs and LP. Specifically, we find a percentage increase in breast cancer DALYs to be associated with a 0.27% and 0.87% fall in LP in the short- and long-run periods, respectively, at the 1% level of significance. The findings are robust using the other measures of breast cancer and different estimation techniques. There is a need to enhance measures towards breast cancer prevention and control in Africa such as timely diagnosis, all-inclusive management of breast cancer, health promotion geared towards early detection and the creation of dependable referral systems to significantly reduce its associated LP losses.
乳腺癌仍然是影响全球女性的主要疾病之一。与高收入地区相比,非洲等低收入地区的女性被诊断出患有乳腺癌的可能性较小,但患病后死亡的可能性更大。除了乳腺癌对健康造成的负面影响外,它还会在微观和宏观层面降低患者的劳动生产率(LP)。然而,关于乳腺癌对劳动生产率影响的实证证据很少,且大多集中在微观层面,因此无法更全面地洞察与该疾病相关的生产率损失。据我们所知,本研究首次提供了非洲国家层面关于乳腺癌(对女性)对劳动生产率影响的宏观实证证据。该研究使用了1992年至2021年期间47个非洲国家的数据。女性乳腺癌相关的伤残调整生命年(DALYs)被用作乳腺癌的基线衡量指标,而女性该疾病相关的伤残生活年(YLDs)和死亡则被用作稳健性衡量指标。系统广义矩估计(GMM)回归被用作主要估计技术,另外还使用了两种估计方法进行稳健性检验。我们的分析揭示了乳腺癌DALYs与劳动生产率之间存在统计学上显著的负相关关系。具体而言,我们发现,在1%的显著性水平上,乳腺癌DALYs的百分比增加分别与短期和长期劳动生产率下降0.27%和0.87%相关。使用其他乳腺癌衡量指标和不同估计技术时,研究结果具有稳健性。有必要加强非洲的乳腺癌预防和控制措施,如及时诊断、全面的乳腺癌管理、促进早期发现的健康促进活动以及建立可靠的转诊系统,以显著减少其相关的劳动生产率损失。