Wendy Janssens
Biographic Data
| ID | 2253174 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Wendy Janssens |
| GIVEN NAMES | Wendy |
| FAMILY NAME | Janssens |
| SIGNATURE | JANSSENS W |
| AFFILIATIONS | Tinbergen Institute |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-2085-8608 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 15 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 44 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 15 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2010 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
Women's empowerment and mental well-being
Perinatal mental health is a significant concern globally, especially in low- and middle-income countries. Women's mental well-being is essential for managing daily stresses and positively contributing to their communities. Empowering women can enhance their health and that of their families. This paper explores how women's empowerment(WE) in rural Kenyan communities affects their maternal mental well-being and discusses the challenges and lesson…
Gendered Barriers to Formal Health-Care Utilization
This paper develops a model of health-care demand to study health-care choices in resource-limited settings with poor health indicators, especially for women. Using data from rural Nigeria on individual illnesses and injuries as well as the entire portfolio of locally available providers, we estimate the effect of price, distance, and quality on access to care, focusing on the heterogeneous responses to these three factors by gender. We find that…
The impact of digital interventions on health insurance coverage for reproductive, maternal, newborn and child health services utilization in Kakamega, Kenya
The National Hospital Insurance Fund (NHIF) of Kenya was upgraded to improve access to healthcare for impoverished households, expand universal health coverage, and boost the uptake of essential reproductive, maternal, newborn and child health (RMNCH) services. However, premiums may be unaffordable for the poorest households. The Innovative Partnership for Universal Sustainable Healthcare (i-PUSH) programme targets low-income women and their hous…
Reduced incidence of respiratory, gastrointestinal and malaria infections among children during the Covid-19 pandemic in Western Kenya
Background: Epidemics can cause significant disruptions of essential health care services. This was evident in West-Africa during the 2014-2016 Ebola outbreak, raising concerns that COVID-19 would have similar devastating consequences for the continent. Indeed, official facility-based records show a reduction in health care visits after the onset of COVID-19 in Kenya. Our question is whether this observed reduction was caused by lower access to h…
Liquid milk
Limited access to reliable financial instruments makes it difficult for rural households to manage daily cash flows. Selling goods through cooperatives can improve savings, but cooperative income is not easily accessible when facing an emergency. Cash-constrained households may therefore side-sell in local markets that pay on the spot, while insurance could reduce the need to side-sell. We test these hypotheses using panel data for farmers from t…
Implementing value-based healthcare using a digital health exchange platform to improve pregnancy and childbirth outcomes in urban and rural Kenya
Maternal and neonatal mortality rates in many low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) are still far above the targets of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 3. Value-based healthcare (VBHC) has the potential to outperform traditional supply-driven approaches in changing this dismal situation, and significantly improve maternal, neonatal and child health (MNCH) outcomes. We developed a theory of change and used a cohort-based implemen…
The power to protect
Women may face systematically greater benefits than men from adopting certain technologies, for example some health-improving technologies. Yet women often hold lower bargaining power, such that men’s preferences may constrain household adoption in households containing men. Introducing a version of the technology that is less effective, but has lower perceived costs or higher perceived benefits to men, may increase adoption and household welfare…
The short-term economic effects of Covid-19 on low-income households in rural Kenya
This research assesses how low-income households in rural Kenya coped with the immediate economic consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic. It uses granular financial data from weekly household interviews covering six weeks before the first case was detected in Kenya to five weeks after during which various containment measures were implemented. Based on household-level fixed-effects regressions, our results suggest that income from work decreased w…
The prominent role of informal medicine vendors despite health insurance
In sub-Saharan Africa, accessibility to affordable quality care is often poor and health expenditures are mostly paid out of pocket. Health insurance, protecting individuals from out-of-pocket health expenses, has been put forward as a means of enhancing universal health coverage. We explored the utilization of different types of healthcare providers and the factors associated with provider choice by insurance status in rural Nigeria. We analysed…
Health insurance, a friend in need? Impacts of formal insurance and crowding out of informal insurance
Health insurance can improve health-seeking behaviors and protect consumption from health shocks but may also crowd out informal insurance. This paper therefore examines whether impacts of health insurance depend on households’ access to informal insurance, as proxied for by mobile money usage. Based on high-frequency financial diaries data collected in rural Kenya, we find that households with weaker access to informal insurance cope with uninsu…
Be patient when measuring hyperbolic discounting
Most evidence of hyperbolic discounting is based on violations of either stationarity or time consistency as observed in choice experiments. These choice reversals may however also result from time-varying discount rates. Hyperbolic discounting is a plausible explanation for choice reversals only if violations of stationarity and time consistency overlap. Our field experiment examines the extent to which this is the case. At different points in t…
Empowering Women or Pleasing Men? Analyzing Male Views on Female Condom Use In Zimbabwe, Nigeria and Cameroon
CONTEXT: Usage rates of female condoms are low throughout Sub-Saharan Africa. Programs have traditionally presented female condoms as a means of women's empowerment. However, prevailing gender norms in Sub-Saharan Africa assign sexual decision making to men, suggesting that male acceptance is imperative for increased use. METHODS: In 2011, data on perceptions of and experiences with female condom use were collected from 336 men in Zimbabwe, Niger…
Refusal Bias in the Estimation of HIV Prevalence
In 2007, UNAIDS corrected estimates of global HIV prevalence downward from 40 million to 33 million based on a methodological shift from sentinel surveillance to population-based surveys. Since then, population-based surveys are considered the gold standard for estimating HIV prevalence. However, prevalence rates based on representative surveys may be biased because of nonresponse. This article investigates one potential source of nonresponse bia…
The inequitable impact of health shocks on the uninsured in Namibia
The AIDS pandemic in sub-Saharan Africa puts increasing pressure on the buffer capacity of low- and middle-income households without access to health insurance. This paper examines the relationship between health shocks, insurance status and health-seeking behaviour. It also investigates the possible mitigating effects of insurance on income loss and out-of-pocket health expenditure. The study uses a unique dataset based on a random sample of 176…
Women’s Empowerment and the Creation of Social Capital in Indian Villages
Women’s Empowerment and the Creation of Social Capital in Indian Villages
The short-term economic effects of Covid-19 on low-income households in rural Kenya
This research assesses how low-income households in rural Kenya coped with the immediate economic consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic. It uses granular financial data from weekly household interviews covering six weeks before the first case was detected in Kenya to five weeks after during which various containment measures were implemented. Based on household-level fixed-effects regressions, our results suggest that income from work decreased w…
Health insurance, a friend in need? Impacts of formal insurance and crowding out of informal insurance
Health insurance can improve health-seeking behaviors and protect consumption from health shocks but may also crowd out informal insurance. This paper therefore examines whether impacts of health insurance depend on households’ access to informal insurance, as proxied for by mobile money usage. Based on high-frequency financial diaries data collected in rural Kenya, we find that households with weaker access to informal insurance cope with uninsu…
Liquid milk
Limited access to reliable financial instruments makes it difficult for rural households to manage daily cash flows. Selling goods through cooperatives can improve savings, but cooperative income is not easily accessible when facing an emergency. Cash-constrained households may therefore side-sell in local markets that pay on the spot, while insurance could reduce the need to side-sell. We test these hypotheses using panel data for farmers from t…
The prominent role of informal medicine vendors despite health insurance
In sub-Saharan Africa, accessibility to affordable quality care is often poor and health expenditures are mostly paid out of pocket. Health insurance, protecting individuals from out-of-pocket health expenses, has been put forward as a means of enhancing universal health coverage. We explored the utilization of different types of healthcare providers and the factors associated with provider choice by insurance status in rural Nigeria. We analysed…
Be patient when measuring hyperbolic discounting
Most evidence of hyperbolic discounting is based on violations of either stationarity or time consistency as observed in choice experiments. These choice reversals may however also result from time-varying discount rates. Hyperbolic discounting is a plausible explanation for choice reversals only if violations of stationarity and time consistency overlap. Our field experiment examines the extent to which this is the case. At different points in t…
The power to protect
Women may face systematically greater benefits than men from adopting certain technologies, for example some health-improving technologies. Yet women often hold lower bargaining power, such that men’s preferences may constrain household adoption in households containing men. Introducing a version of the technology that is less effective, but has lower perceived costs or higher perceived benefits to men, may increase adoption and household welfare…
The inequitable impact of health shocks on the uninsured in Namibia
The AIDS pandemic in sub-Saharan Africa puts increasing pressure on the buffer capacity of low- and middle-income households without access to health insurance. This paper examines the relationship between health shocks, insurance status and health-seeking behaviour. It also investigates the possible mitigating effects of insurance on income loss and out-of-pocket health expenditure. The study uses a unique dataset based on a random sample of 176…
Women’s Empowerment and the Creation of Social Capital in Indian Villages
The inequitable impact of health shocks on the uninsured in Namibia
The AIDS pandemic in sub-Saharan Africa puts increasing pressure on the buffer capacity of low- and middle-income households without access to health insurance. This paper examines the relationship between health shocks, insurance status and health-seeking behaviour. It also investigates the possible mitigating effects of insurance on income loss and out-of-pocket health expenditure. The study uses a unique dataset based on a random sample of 176…
Refusal Bias in the Estimation of HIV Prevalence
In 2007, UNAIDS corrected estimates of global HIV prevalence downward from 40 million to 33 million based on a methodological shift from sentinel surveillance to population-based surveys. Since then, population-based surveys are considered the gold standard for estimating HIV prevalence. However, prevalence rates based on representative surveys may be biased because of nonresponse. This article investigates one potential source of nonresponse bia…
Empowering Women or Pleasing Men? Analyzing Male Views on Female Condom Use In Zimbabwe, Nigeria and Cameroon
CONTEXT: Usage rates of female condoms are low throughout Sub-Saharan Africa. Programs have traditionally presented female condoms as a means of women's empowerment. However, prevailing gender norms in Sub-Saharan Africa assign sexual decision making to men, suggesting that male acceptance is imperative for increased use. METHODS: In 2011, data on perceptions of and experiences with female condom use were collected from 336 men in Zimbabwe, Niger…
Be patient when measuring hyperbolic discounting
Most evidence of hyperbolic discounting is based on violations of either stationarity or time consistency as observed in choice experiments. These choice reversals may however also result from time-varying discount rates. Hyperbolic discounting is a plausible explanation for choice reversals only if violations of stationarity and time consistency overlap. Our field experiment examines the extent to which this is the case. At different points in t…
Health insurance, a friend in need? Impacts of formal insurance and crowding out of informal insurance
Health insurance can improve health-seeking behaviors and protect consumption from health shocks but may also crowd out informal insurance. This paper therefore examines whether impacts of health insurance depend on households’ access to informal insurance, as proxied for by mobile money usage. Based on high-frequency financial diaries data collected in rural Kenya, we find that households with weaker access to informal insurance cope with uninsu…
The short-term economic effects of Covid-19 on low-income households in rural Kenya
This research assesses how low-income households in rural Kenya coped with the immediate economic consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic. It uses granular financial data from weekly household interviews covering six weeks before the first case was detected in Kenya to five weeks after during which various containment measures were implemented. Based on household-level fixed-effects regressions, our results suggest that income from work decreased w…
The prominent role of informal medicine vendors despite health insurance
In sub-Saharan Africa, accessibility to affordable quality care is often poor and health expenditures are mostly paid out of pocket. Health insurance, protecting individuals from out-of-pocket health expenses, has been put forward as a means of enhancing universal health coverage. We explored the utilization of different types of healthcare providers and the factors associated with provider choice by insurance status in rural Nigeria. We analysed…
The power to protect
Women may face systematically greater benefits than men from adopting certain technologies, for example some health-improving technologies. Yet women often hold lower bargaining power, such that men’s preferences may constrain household adoption in households containing men. Introducing a version of the technology that is less effective, but has lower perceived costs or higher perceived benefits to men, may increase adoption and household welfare…
Implementing value-based healthcare using a digital health exchange platform to improve pregnancy and childbirth outcomes in urban and rural Kenya
Maternal and neonatal mortality rates in many low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) are still far above the targets of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 3. Value-based healthcare (VBHC) has the potential to outperform traditional supply-driven approaches in changing this dismal situation, and significantly improve maternal, neonatal and child health (MNCH) outcomes. We developed a theory of change and used a cohort-based implemen…
Reduced incidence of respiratory, gastrointestinal and malaria infections among children during the Covid-19 pandemic in Western Kenya
Background: Epidemics can cause significant disruptions of essential health care services. This was evident in West-Africa during the 2014-2016 Ebola outbreak, raising concerns that COVID-19 would have similar devastating consequences for the continent. Indeed, official facility-based records show a reduction in health care visits after the onset of COVID-19 in Kenya. Our question is whether this observed reduction was caused by lower access to h…
Liquid milk
Limited access to reliable financial instruments makes it difficult for rural households to manage daily cash flows. Selling goods through cooperatives can improve savings, but cooperative income is not easily accessible when facing an emergency. Cash-constrained households may therefore side-sell in local markets that pay on the spot, while insurance could reduce the need to side-sell. We test these hypotheses using panel data for farmers from t…
The impact of digital interventions on health insurance coverage for reproductive, maternal, newborn and child health services utilization in Kakamega, Kenya
The National Hospital Insurance Fund (NHIF) of Kenya was upgraded to improve access to healthcare for impoverished households, expand universal health coverage, and boost the uptake of essential reproductive, maternal, newborn and child health (RMNCH) services. However, premiums may be unaffordable for the poorest households. The Innovative Partnership for Universal Sustainable Healthcare (i-PUSH) programme targets low-income women and their hous…
Women's empowerment and mental well-being
Perinatal mental health is a significant concern globally, especially in low- and middle-income countries. Women's mental well-being is essential for managing daily stresses and positively contributing to their communities. Empowering women can enhance their health and that of their families. This paper explores how women's empowerment(WE) in rural Kenyan communities affects their maternal mental well-being and discusses the challenges and lesson…
Gendered Barriers to Formal Health-Care Utilization
This paper develops a model of health-care demand to study health-care choices in resource-limited settings with poor health indicators, especially for women. Using data from rural Nigeria on individual illnesses and injuries as well as the entire portfolio of locally available providers, we estimate the effect of price, distance, and quality on access to care, focusing on the heterogeneous responses to these three factors by gender. We find that…
Economics (11 works) · Economic growth (9 works) · Business (8 works) · Medicine (8 works) · Environmental health (6 works) · Poverty, Education, and Child Welfare (6 works) · Agricultural risk and resilience (5 works) · Health care (5 works) · Demographic economics (4 works) · Microfinance and Financial Inclusion (4 works)