Under-Five Mortality Estimation: Assessing Summary Birth History Methods with Microsimulation

Andrea Verhulst, Université Catholique de Louvain

In order to track progress on the under-five mortality rate, summary birth histories collected in surveys and censuses are a key source of data in many developing countries. Two kinds of methods for analyzing summary birth histories are now available to users: first, model-based methods derived from the pioneer work of Brass, second, empirically-based methods developed more recently by researchers at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation. In this paper, we assess them comparatively against gold standard estimates generated by demographic microsimulations.