Consumer behavior and drug quality in Burkina FasoHCHE Research Seminar: Self-medication under uncertainty: insights on consumer behavior and drug quality in Burkina Faso

8 July 2024, 4:30 pm

Prof. Renate Hartwig from the Ruhr University Bochum presents insights into consumer behavior and drug quality in Burkina Faso.

In many countries, access to affordable, quality-assured, and effective medicine is constrained by inadequate regulation, poor supply chain management, and weak gatekeeping, resulting in the proliferation of substandard or falsified (SF) products. In the absence of access to quality health care and with drugs available over-the-counter (OTC, without prescription), consumers often resort to self-medication. Self-medication is associated with an overuse of antibiotics, which in turn is a driver of the spread of antimicrobial resistant (AMR) bacteria. In this study, we aim to better understand self-medication with antibiotics in a low-income setting bringing together data from chemical drug quality testing, household surveys and field experimentation.

Renate Hartwig is a researcher at the Economic Policy Lab "Climate Change, Development and Migration" at RWI and professor of empirical development economics at the Ruhr University Bochum. Her research interests are in the areas of family economics, political economy, demography and global health. Methodologically, Renate works with both randomized and non-randomized reserach designs, and very often in interdisciplinary teams. Much of her work is based on primary data collected primarily in West, Central and East Africa and Indonesia. The results of her work have been published in leading field journals including the Journal of Development Economics, Economic Development & Cultural Change and World Development, among others.

Further information about the event and how to participate can be found here.