Heat, infant mortality, and adaptation: Evidence from India

We examine the impact of extreme heat during pregnancy on infant mortality and check if public interventions can serve as effective adaptation strategies. We show that 2 children die as infants out of 1000 births in India for high temperature during pregnancy, tentatively due to reduced agricultural yields, wages, and greater disease prevalence like diarrhea. The heat-infant mortality relationship holds in rural India only. Using phased introduction of an employment guarantee program and partial introduction of a community health care worker program for identification, we find that only the health program is effective in modifying the temperature-infant mortality relationship in rural India. •It is unclear if public health investments can moderate the effects of global warming.•We find 2 out 1000 children die as infants in India from heat during pregnancy.•Community health workers moderates this temperature-infant mortality relationship.