Saúde ambiental e crescimento econômico nos municípios brasileiros: teste das hipóteses da curva de Kuznets ambiental e da transição epidemiológica

Abstract

How to achieve sustainable development able to meet the economic, social and environmental needs of today's society without compromising the capacity to meet the needs of future generations? This important debate involves those who consider economic growth the biggest cause of environmental problems and those who advocate economic growth as the best way to achieve environmental quality. The purpose of this dissertation were analyze a relation between economic growth and municipal health indicators that reflect environmental problems, such as air pollution and basic sanitation, testing: a Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC) traditional “inverted-u”, a relation in “N” shape, and the Epidemiological Transition. Indirect measures of environmental degradation were adopted represented by morbidity and mortality indicators (hospitalizations and deaths) for environmental diseases (respiratory, circulatory and sanitation diseases). A panel data econometric estimations were performed using the fixed effects method to brazilian cities from 1999 to 2012. The results corroborate a EKC “inverted-u” for morbidity and “N” shape for mortality to circulatory and respiratory diseases, but is not verifiable to basic sanitation diseases. There is evidence of the occurrence of the Epidemiologic Transition (decrease in mortality from infectious and parasitic diseases). Key-words: Economic growth; Environmental Kuznets curve; Panel data; Epidemiologic transition; Health.