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More information: CV (pdf)

Summary

• Expertise in demography, global health, data analysis, and scientific writing
• Seven years of quantitative research experience following PhD completion
• Author of 38 peer-reviewed articles, including 24 as lead author
• Delivered 11 invited seminars and 8 conference presentations
• Supervised three master’s theses
• Research topics include mortality, child health, population aging, living standards

Skills

Methods: Demographic methods, econometrics, parallel computing, generalized linear models, decomposition techniques, multilevel models, small area estimation, time series analysis, survival analysis, nonparametric regressions

Tools: Expert in Stata; experienced in JavaScript (D3.js), GitHub, Excel; working knowledge of Python; familiar with SPSS, R

Data: Large-scale datasets, data integration, household surveys, life tables, geospatial data, data visualizations, dashboard design

Communication and collaboration: Scientific and grant writing, literature reviews, public speaking, interdisciplinary and international collaborations, mentoring graduate students

Peer-Reviewed Journal Articles

Global Disparities in Premature Mortality: Progress Relative to the Lowest Mortality Frontier
by Karlsson O, Jamison D, Yamey G, Bolongaita S, Mao W, Chang AY, Norheim OF, Ogbuoji O & Verguet S
in JAMA Health Forum, forthcoming

Epidemiological and demographic trends and projections in global health 1970-2050: Analysis from the 3rd Lancet Commission on Investing in Health, Global Health 2050
by Chang AY, Bolongaita S, Cao B, Castro M, Karlsson O, Mao W, Norheim OF, Ogbuoji O & Jamison DT
in The Lancet, forthcoming

Priority Health Conditions and Global Life Expectancy Disparities
by Karlsson O, Chang AY, Norheim OF, Mao W, Bolongaita S & Jamison DT
in JAMA Network Open, 2025

Age Decomposition of Mortality Rates Among Children Younger Than 5 Years in 47 LMICs
by Karlsson O, Pullum TW, Kumar A, Kim R & Subramanian SV
in JAMA Pediatrics, 2025

Trends in low birth weight across 36 states and union territories in India, 1993-2021.
by Karlsson O, Kumar A, Kim R & Subramanian SV
in BMJ Global Health, 2025

Prevalence of severe and moderate anthropometric failure among children in India, 1993–2021
by Narayanan M, Karlsson O, Kumar A, Pullum TW, Kim R, & Subramanian SV
in Maternal Child Nutrition, 2025

Global health 2050: the road to halving premature death by mid-century
by Jamison DT, Summers LH, Chang AY, Karlsson O, Mao W, Norheim OF, Ogbuoji O, Schäferhoff M, Watkins D, Adeyi O, Alleyne G, Alwan A, Anand S, Nigatu Belachew R, Berkley S, Bertozzi S, Bolongaita S, Bundy D, …, & Yamey G
in The Lancet, 2024

Halving premature death and improving the quality of life at all ages
by Norheim OF, Chang AY, Bolongaita S, Barraza-Lloréns L, Fawole A, Gebremedhin LD, González Pier E, Jha P, Johnson E, Karlsson O, Kiros, M, Lewington S, Mao W, Ogbuoji O, Pate M, Sargent J, Tang X, Watkins D, Yamey G, Yip W, Jamison D & Peto R
in The Lancet, 2024

Washing machine ownership and girls' school attendance: a cross-sectional analysis of adolescents in 19 middle-income countries
by Karlsson O & De Neve JW
in Journal of Economic Inequality, 2024

Relationship between adolescent anemia and school attendance observed during a nationally representative survey in India
by De Neve JW, Karlsson O, Rai RK, Kumar S & Vollmer S
in Communications Medicine, 2024

International Trends in Zinc Treatment for Diarrhea
by Karlsson O, Kim R & Subramanian SV
in Pediatrics, 2024

Prevalence and Trends of Not Receiving a Dose of DPT-Containing Vaccine Among Children 12-35 Months: An Analysis of 81 Low- And Middle-Income Countries
by Karlsson O, Rajpal S, Johri M, Kim R & Subramanian SV
in Journal of Epidemiology and Global Health, 2024

Association between neonatal mortality and births not weighed among 400 thousand institutional deliveries in 32 low- and middle-income countries
by Karlsson O, Benski C, Kapoor M, Kim R & Subramanian SV
in Journal of Public Health, 2024

Prevalence of Children Aged 6 to 23 Months Who Did Not Consume Animal Milk, Formula, or Solid or Semisolid Food During the Last 24 Hours Across Low- and Middle-Income Countries
by Karlsson O, Kim R & Subramanian SV
in JAMA Network Open, 2024

Refrigerator ownership and child health and nutrition in low- and middle-income countries
by Karlsson O & Subramanian SV
in Global Food Security, 2023

Patterns in child stunting by age: A cross-sectional study of 94 low- and middle-income countries
by Karlsson O, Kim R, Moloney GM, Hasman A & Subramanian SV
in Maternal and Child Nutrition, 2023

Maternal height and child health and schooling in sub-Saharan Africa: Decomposition and heterogeneity
by Karlsson O & Dribe M
in Social Science & Medicine, 2022

Scarring and selection effects on children surviving elevated rates of postneonatal mortality in sub-Saharan Africa
by Karlsson O
in SSM - Population Health, 2022

Inequality in early life: Social class differences in childhood mortality in southern Sweden, 1815–1967
by Dribe M & Karlsson O
in Economic History Review, 2022

Childhood Diarrhea Prevalence and Uptake of Oral Rehydration Solution and Zinc Treatment in Nigeria
by Egbewale BE, Karlsson O & Sudfeld CR
in Children, 2022

Age Distribution of All-Cause Mortality Among Children Younger Than 5 Years in Low- and Middle-Income Countries
by Karlsson O, Kim R, Hasman A & Subramanian SV
in JAMA Network Open, 2022

Child wasting before and after age two years: A cross-sectional study of 94 countries
by Karlsson O, Kim R, Guerrero S, Hasman A & Subramanian SV
in EClinicalMedicine, 2022

Estimating heritability of height without zygosity information for twins under five years in low- and middle-income countries: An application of normal finite mixture distribution models
by Karlsson O, Domingue BW, Kim R & Subramanian SV
in SSM - Population Health, 2022

Maternal height-standardized prevalence of stunting in 67 low- and middle-income countries
by Karlsson O, Kim R, Bogin B & Subramanian SV
in Journal of Epidemiology, 2022

Consumption of Vitamin-A-Rich Foods and Vitamin A Supplementation for Children under Two Years Old in 51 Low- and Middle-Income Countries
by Karlsson O, Kim R, Hasman A & Subramanian SV
in Nutrients, 2021

Trends in underweight, stunting, and wasting prevalence and inequality among children under three in Indian states, 1993-2016
by Karlsson O, Kim R, Sarwal R, James KS & Subramanian SV
in Scientific Reports, 2021

Distribution of under-5 deaths in the neonatal, postneonatal, and childhood periods: a multicountry analysis in 64 low- and middle-income countries
by Li, Z, Karlsson O, Kim R & Subramanian SV
in International Journal for Equity in Health, 2021

Children's education and parental old-age health: Evidence from a population-based, nationally representative study in India
by Thoma B, Sudharsanan N, Karlsson O, Joe W, Subramanian SV & De Neve JW
in Population Studies, 2021

The effects of economic stress and urbanization on driving behaviours of boda-boda drivers and accidents in gulu, northern uganda: A qualitative view of drivers
by Kitara DL & Karlsson O
in Pan African Medical Journal, 2020

Are out-of-school adolescents at higher risk of adverse health outcomes? Evidence from 9 diverse settings in sub-Saharan Africa
by De Neve JW, Karlsson O, Canavan CR, Chukwu A, Adu-Afarwuah S, Bukenya J, Darling AM, Harling G, Moshabela M, Killewo J, Fink G, Fawzi WW & Berhane Y
in Tropical Medicine & International Health, 2020

Changing speed of reduction in under-5 mortality rates over the 20th century
by Karlsson O, Dribe M & Subramanian SV
in Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, 2020

Analysis of Attained Height and Diabetes Among 554,122 Adults Across 25 Low- and Middle-Income Countries
by Teufel F, Geldsetzer P, Manne-Goehler J, Karlsson O, Koncz V, Deckert A, Theilmann M, Marcus M-E, Ebert C, Seiglie JA, Agoudavi K, Andall-Brereton G, Gathecha G, Gurung MS, Guwatudde D, Houehanou C, Hwalla N, Kagaruki GB, Karki KB, Labadarios D, Martins JS, Msaidie M, Norov B, Sibai AM, Sturua L, Tsabedze L, Wesseh CS, Davies J, Atun R, Vollmer S, Subramanian SV, Bärnighausen T, Jaacks LM & De Neve JW
in Diabetes Care, 2020

Geo-mapping of COVID-19 Risk Correlates Across Districts and Parliamentary Constituencies in India
by Subramanian SV, Karlsson O, Zhang W & Kim R
in Harvard Data Science Review, 2020

The relationship of household assets and amenities with child health outcomes: an exploratory cross-sectional study in India 2015–2016
by Karlsson O, Kim R, Joe W & Subramanian SV
in SSM - Population Health, 2020

Religion and child health in West and Central Africa
by Karlsson O
in Population and Development Review, 2019

Socioeconomic and gender inequalities in neonatal, postneonatal and child mortality in India: A repeated cross-sectional study, 2005-2016
by Karlsson O, Kim R, Joe, W & Subramanian SV
in Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, 2019

Antiretroviral therapy coverage associated with increased co-residence between older and working-age adults in Africa
by De Neve JW, Karlsson O, Coetzee L, Schröder H, Subramanian SV, Bärnighausen T & Vollmer S
in AIDS, 2018

Weakening association of parental education: analysis of child health outcomes in 43 low- and middle-income countries
by Karlsson O, De Neve JW & Subramanian SV
in International Journal of Epidemiology, 2018

Journal correspondence and comments

Reflections on the Lancet Commission on Investing in Health's Global Health 2050 report – Authors' reply [Correspondence]
by Watkins DA, Chang AY, Karlsson O, Mao W, Norheim OF, Ogbuoji O, Schäferhoff M, Yamey G & Jamison D
in The Lancet, 2025

Should India adopt a country-specific growth reference to measure undernutrition among its children? [Comment]
by Subramanian SV, Khailkar A & Karlsson O
in The Lancet Regional Health - Southeast Asia, 2023

Using height-adjusted stunting prevalence will fail disadvantaged children worldwide, authors reply [Correspondence]
by Subramanian SV, Karlsson O & Kim R
in The Lancet Global Health, 2022

Revisiting the stunting metric for monitoring and evaluating nutrition policies [Comment]
by Subramanian SV, Karlsson O & Kim R
in The Lancet Global Health, 2022

Lessons from COVID-19 pandemic for the child survival agenda [Comment]
by Subramanian SV, Chatterjee P & Karlsson O
in Journal of Global Health, 2020

Seminars and Lectures

The German Association for Health Economics, dggö-Talk, online, May 2025. Global Health 2050: The path to halving premature death by mid-century (with Marko Schäferhoff).

Prince Mahidol Award Conference, Side Meeting, Bangkok, Thailand, January 2025. Global Health 2050: Leveraging technological advances to halve premature deaths by 2050 (with Angela Chan and Saeda Makimoto).

Duke Global Health Institute, Guest Lecturer in Gavin Yamey’s course Global Health Policy: Transforming Evidence into Action, Durham, NC, USA, March 2025. Global Health 2050: The 3rd Report of the Lancet Commission on Investing in Health (CIH 3.0).

Duke University Population Research Institute, Seminar Series, Durham, NC, USA, December 2024. Global Health 2050: The path to halving premature death by mid-century.

Korea University, International Symposium on Precision Public Health, online, May 2023. Differences in child mortality and morbidity across the first five years in low- and middle-income countries.

UNICEF, Nutrition Master Class, online, November 2021. To what extent is child mortality and wasting prevalence concentrated before age two? Implications for nutrition and health programs.

Harvard Center for Population and Development Studies, Friday Luncheon Seminar, Cambridge, MA, USA, February 2020. Household technology and child health.

Lund University, Development Research Day, Lund, Sweden, October 2017. Maternal Height and Child Development in Sub-Saharan Africa: Mechanisms and Interventions.

Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Landmark Meeting, Boston, MA, USA, August 2017. Temporal Changes in the Association between Parental Education and Child Health: Evidence from 86 Demographic and Health Surveys from 43 Low- and Middle-Income Countries.

Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Landmark Meeting, Boston, MA, USA, November 2016. Influence of Disease Environment in Infancy on Child Health and Education in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Lund University, Department of Economic History Research Seminar, Sweden, March 2016. Intergenerational Transmission of Capabilities: Mothers and Children in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Conference Presentations

Consortium of Universities for Global Health Annual Conference, Los Angeles, CA, USA, March 2024. Life expectancy deficits by cause of death: a life table decomposition.

Population Association of America Annual Meeting, New Orleans, LA, USA, April 2023. Anemia severity and school attendance among 251,401 adolescents aged 15–18 years: a nationally representative household fixed-effects study in India.

European Population Conference, Brussels, Belgium, June 2018. Influence of Disease Environment in Infancy on Childhood Health and Education in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Population Association of America Annual Meeting, Denver, CO, USA, April 2018. Religion and Child Health in Sub-Saharan Africa: Religious Affiliation and Community-Level Religious Composition.

Population Association of America Annual Meeting, Chicago, IL, USA, April 2017. Influence of Disease Environment in Infancy on Child Growth in Sub-Saharan Africa. [Poster]

Population Association of America Annual Meeting, Washington, DC, USA, April 2016. Influence of Disease Exposure in Infancy on Childhood Health and Education in Sub-Saharan Africa. [Poster]

Africa Population Conference, Pretoria, South Africa, November 2015. Intergenerational Transmission of Capabilities: Mothers and Children in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Population Association of America Annual Meeting, San Diego, CA, USA, April 2015. Intergenerational Transmission of Capabilities: Mothers and Children in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Data Dashboard for the Lancet Commission on Investing in Health

I created (using JavaScript D3) and host an interactive dashboard displaying visualizations of key metrics, trends, and projections for the Lancet Commission on Investing in Health. This allows commissioners to explore data layers and generate displays as needed.

Open dashboard in new tab

The dashboard was for example used to generate Figures for the article Salud Global 2050: implicaciones para México by González-Pier E, Barraza-Lloréns M, Bertozzi SM, Jamison DT, Knaul FM and Yamey G published in Salud Pública de México, 2025

For more information about the Lancet Commission on Investing in Health, see the official website.

Global health 2050: the path to halving premature death by mid-century

The third report of the Lancet Commission on Investing in Health (CIH) emphasizes that by 2050, all countries can halve the probability of premature death—defined as dying before the age 70 years—through targeted investments in health systems and interventions. This goal, referred to as "50 by 50," is both ambitious and achievable, demonstrated by impressive mortality declines in countries as diverse as Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Iran, Türkiye, Norway, and South Korea.

The report identifies 15 priority health conditions: eight infectious diseases and maternal and child conditions and seven non-communicable diseases and injuries, such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and tobacco-related cancers. In the countries with the highest mortality rates, infectious diseases and maternal and child health need to be addressed. All countries need to combat non-communicable diseases and injuries.

The report stresses the importance of strengthening health systems, particularly primary care and first-level hospitals, to manage the 15 priority conditions, by packaging health interventions into 19 modules, such as childhood immunization and cardiovascular disease prevention and treatment, which will help countries tailor their health investments to their specific needs.

Achieving the 50 by 50 goal also requires systemic changes in how countries allocate their health budgets. Many countries fail to direct sufficient resources toward priority interventions. Governments need to redirect budgets toward essential drugs, vaccines, diagnostics, and other commodities needed to reduce mortality from the 15 priority conditions. Procurement systems should be centralized and scaled to ensure that these health products are always available. Tobacco control is highlighted as a critical area, with the report recommending high excise taxes on tobacco and other policies to curb tobacco-related deaths and (initially) raise important revenue.

In addition to national reforms, the report calls for renewed commitments from the international development community. Development assistance should primarily provide financial and technical support to countries with limited resources, to help develop their health systems. It should also finance global public goods, such as combating antimicrobial resistance and preparing for future pandemics. The report stresses that significant advances in health technology—such as vaccines for malaria and tuberculosis—are on the horizon, and scaling up investments in these and other innovations will be crucial to achieving the 50 by 50 goal.

Lancet Commission on Investing in Health website

Main tasks and achievements

• Developed an online interactive dashboard to visualize key metrics enabling commissioners to explore data layers and generate displays as needed
• Managed ad-hoc data needs from commissioners requesting tailored summaries or visualizations to aid in concept development and presentation of results to stakeholders
• Led research quantifying the contribution of specific causes of death to changes in life expectancy over time and differences across locations using life table decompositions
• Used time series analysis and multilevel models to study trends and rates of change in various health metrics
• Authored five peer-reviewed articles, including two as lead author
• Presented findings at three seminars, a lecture, and a conference

CIH articles I led

Karlsson O, Chang AY, Norheim OF, Mao W, Bolongaita S, Jamison DT (2025). Priority Health Conditions and Global Life Expectancy Disparities. JAMA Network Open, 8(5), e2512198.

Karlsson O, Jamison D, Yamey G, Bolongaita S, Mao W, Chang AY, Norheim OF, Ogbuoji O & Verguet S (forthcoming). Global Disparities in Premature Mortality: Progress Relative to the Lowest Mortality Frontier. JAMA Health Forum.

CIH articles I co-authored

Chang AY, Bolongaita S, Cao B, Castro M, Karlsson O, Mao W, Norheim OF, Ogbuoji O & Jamison DT (forthcoming). Epidemiological and demographic trends and projections in global health 1970–2050: Analysis from the 3rd Lancet Commission on Investing in Health, Global Health 2050. The Lancet.

Jamison DT, Summers LH, Chang AY, Karlsson O, Mao W, Norheim OF, Ogbuoji O, Schäferhoff M, Watkins D, Adeyi O, Alleyne G, Alwan A, Anand S, Nigatu Belachew R, Berkley S, Bertozzi S, Bolongaita S, Bundy D, … & Yamey G (2024). Global health 2050: the road to halving premature death by mid-century. The Lancet, 404(10462), 1561–1614.

Norheim OF, Chang AY, Bolongaita S, Barraza-Lloréns L, Fawole A, Gebremedhin LD, González Pier E, Jha P, Johnson E, Karlsson O, Kiros M, Lewington S, Mao W, Ogbuoji O, Pate M, Sargent J, Tang X, Watkins D, Yamey G, Yip W, Jamison D & Peto R (2024). Halving premature death and improving the quality of life at all ages. The Lancet.

CIH working papers I co-authored

Chang AY, Karlsson O & Jamison D (2024). Quantifying the economic value of mortality change and full income change for 1990–2019 and the COVID-19 pandemic 2020–2023. CIH background paper.

Chang AY, Johnson EK, Bolongaita S, Buse K, Hawkes SJ, Karlsson O, Knaul FM, Kruk M, Norheim OF, Ogbuoji O & Wakings D (2024). Balancing the scales: Towards a more objective measure of sex inequalities in health. CIH background paper.

Improving nutrition and survival for the youngest and most vulnerable children

For this project, I led four scientific studies on the age distribution of important child health outcomes. These studies resulted in four journal publications and a workshop with UNICEF staff.

The first two years after birth are a critical period for growth and development, when malnutrition and infections have the most detrimental impact on child health, as well as human development more broadly. During the first two years, children's bodies and brains are developing rapidly, and they are more susceptible to stunting (low height-for-age) and wasting (low weight-for-height), which significantly increases their risk of death. Malnutrition during this period weakens the immune system, making children more prone to infections, which in turn can exacerbate undernutrition.

The project demonstrated that most child deaths and malnutrition cases are concentrated in children under two years of age. This suggests that prioritizing nutrition programs for this age group could have the greatest impact on reducing child mortality and improving health outcomes. However, the coverage of essential nutrition interventions remains far from complete and highly inequitable, with children from poorer households or rural areas often deprived of the nutrition and care they need. This calls for better strategies to reach the most vulnerable children through well-resourced nutrition programs.

See the UNICEF report based on this project

Main tasks and achievements

• Met with the UNICEF team to understand goals and information needs
• Led customized data analysis to provide actionable insights for program strategy
• Used synthetic cohort probabilities method to estimate the age distribution of deaths
• Used kernel-weighted local-mean regressions to estimate the age patterning of stunting
• Used Poisson regression models to estimate prevalence ratios for child wasting by age
• Led authorship of four reports, all later published in peer-reviewed journals
• Designed and conducted a seminar for UNICEF staff and stakeholders on data interpretation to build capacity for program planning

Journal articles I led

Karlsson O, Kim R, Moloney GM, Hasman A & Subramanian SV (2023). Patterns in child stunting by age: A cross-sectional study of 94 low- and middle-income countries. Maternal and Child Nutrition, 19(4).

Karlsson O, Kim R, Hasman A & Subramanian SV (2022). Age Distribution of All-Cause Mortality Among Children Younger Than 5 Years in Low- and Middle-Income Countries. JAMA Network Open, 5(5), e2212692.

Karlsson O, Kim R, Guerrero S, Hasman A & Subramanian SV (2022). Child wasting before and after age two years: A cross-sectional study of 94 countries. EClinicalMedicine, 46, 101353.

Karlsson O, Kim R, Hasman A & Subramanian SV (2021). Consumption of Vitamin-A-Rich Foods and Vitamin A Supplementation for Children under Two Years Old in 51 Low- and Middle-Income Countries. Nutrients, 14(1).

Various measures of socioeconomic status exist, such as education, occupation, and income, which reflect different underlying attributes that vary in the ways and degree to which they translate into health. In low- and middle-income countries that lack reliable income data, socioeconomic status is commonly measured by wealth indices, constructed from data on ownership of assets (refrigerator, TV, car, etc) and amenities (electricity, toilet, water, etc). Many of these assets and amenities appear to merely reflect aspects of socioeconomic status (or living standards) without direct links to child health. However, my colleagues and I identified assets related to food preparation and storage as well as water and sanitation, as potential direct determinants of child health.

To further establish linkages, I started a project funded by the Swedish Research Council, to study whether and when household technology can improve nutrition, reduce infections, and reduce child labor, thereby improving child health and education in low- and middle-income countries. For example, refrigerators may improve nutrition by increasing the consumption of protein-rich perishable foods and reduce sickness due to food contamination from improper food storage. Electricity, appliances, and piped water can also reduce the burden from household work, allowing parents to augment incomes from other work, improve the quality of household work (eg, hygiene), and increase direct supervision of children, as well as reducing the need for child labor, enabling children—especially girls—to attend school.

This project advanced understanding of whether household technology can improve child health and education in low- and middle-income countries. A large increase in electricity access and appliance ownership was found. At the population level, both increases in electricity access and refrigerator ownership were suggested to be linked to improved child health and nutrition. Further, by analyzing an extensive data set from 66 countries, one study established that children in households with refrigerators exhibited notable improvements in physical growth, a key indicator of nutrition and infections. Although the effect size was modest, it is significant enough to suggest that refrigerator ownership can play a role in reducing undernutrition and infections by enabling increased consumption and safer storage of perishable foods. Further, another study from the project found tentative evidence that household electricity access positively affects child growth, which appears to be mediated by appliance ownership to an extent.

Another paper resulting from this project unveiled a strong association between washing machine ownership and school attendance among girls and not boys, but only in specific contexts. This underscores the importance of contextual factors in assessing the impact of household technology on educational outcomes. Similarly, another study found that time spent on household work is negatively associated with girls' school attendance in most countries, which further explained a substantial part of the female disadvantage in school attendance. However, the relationship of appliance ownership with household work and school attendance was overall unclear and highly context dependent.

Evidence from this project highlight the potential of refrigerators to improve child nutrition and reduce exposure to infections, as well as time-saving appliances to improve girls' school attendance. These findings can be leveraged to advocate for the financing of trials on the effects of appliance ownership on child health and schooling (eg, through provision or subsidization) across low- and middle-income countries, for gathering further evidence.

Main tasks and achievements

• Served as principal investigator
• Implemented high-resolution Coarsened Exact Matching to enable comparisons of outcomes across closely matched groups
• Designed falsification tests using negative control exposures (i.e., placebo tests) to assess residual confounding
• Led authorship of three articles published in peer-reviewed journals
• Presented the project and findings at a seminar at Harvard University

Journal articles from the project

Karlsson O & De Neve JW (2024). Washing machine ownership and girls' school attendance: a cross-sectional analysis of adolescents in 19 middle-income countries. Journal of Economic Inequality, 22 735-755.

Karlsson O & Subramanian SV (2023). Refrigerator ownership and child health and nutrition in low- and middle-income countries. Global Food Security, 37, 100698.

Pilot study for the project

Karlsson O, Kim R, Joe W & Subramanian SV (2020). The relationship of household assets and amenities with child health outcomes: an exploratory cross-sectional study in India 2015–2016. SSM - Population Health, 10, 100513.

Presentations and draft papers

Karlsson O (2022). Ownership of appliances, household work, and girls' school attendance and performance. Unpublished manuscript

Karlsson O (2020). Household technology and human development in low and middle income countries. Presentation for Harvard Center for Population and Development

Karlsson O (2020). Access to electricity and child health in 22 low and middle-income countries. Presentation for The Takemi Fellowship in international Health

Historical demography research on disparities in age-specific under five mortality rates across father’s occupational groups in 19th century Sweden.

Main tasks and achievements

• Managed data from a unique historical economic and demographic database containing all vital events and occupations within a region in southern Sweden
• Conducted survival analysis using Cox proportional hazard models
• Co-authored a peer-reviewed journal article

Journal articles from the project

Dribe M & Karlsson O (2022). Inequality in early life: Social class differences in childhood mortality in southern Sweden, 1815–1967. Economic History Review, 75(2), 475– 502.

In this project I led several studies on height (and co-authored others), investigating what underlies this common measure of health. For example, physical growth, a common measure of child health and development, reflects different processes (eg, diet, infections, and parental height) that may vary in the extent to which they reflect health. My colleagues and I find that at the population level, the prevalence of child growth deficit signals health considerably better after factoring out the influence of maternal height (which is determined by her childhood exposures and genetics and is the strongest observable determinant of child growth). Further, maternal height appears to be linked directly with neonatal mortality while the link between maternal height and mortality later in childhood appears to be related to material living standards and unobserved father characteristics, suggesting that pregnancy and birth related factors are important underlying mechanisms.

Main tasks and achievements

• Developed a spatiotemporal indicator of adversity (e.g., epidemics, food scarcity) during infancy within 50 km of birthplace using geocoded birth histories and used sibling fixed effects models to assess the impact of adversity on child growth
• Combined Mundlak fixed effects and Gelbach decomposition to quantify the impact of unobserved half-sibling-level factors on the association between mother’s height and health
• Designed and tested a health metric: maternal height standardized prevalence of stunting
• Led authorship of five peer-reviewed journal articles
• Presented results at four seminars and five conferences
• Contributed to debates on the appropriate use of anthropometrics in policy setting

Journal articles I led

Karlsson O & Dribe M (2022). Maternal height and child health and schooling in sub-Saharan Africa: Decomposition and heterogeneity. Social Science & Medicine, 315, 115480.

Karlsson O (2022). Scarring and selection effects on children surviving elevated rates of postneonatal mortality in sub-Saharan Africa. SSM - Population Health, 19, 101160.

Karlsson O, Kim R, Bogin B & Subramanian SV (2022). Maternal height-standardized prevalence of stunting in 67 low- and middle-income countries. Journal of Epidemiology, 32(7), pp. 337.

Karlsson, O, Domingue BW, Kim R & Subramanian SV (2022). Estimating heritability of height without zygosity information for twins under five years in low- and middle-income countries: An application of normal finite mixture distribution models. SSM - Population Health, 17, 101043.

Karlsson O, Kim R, Sarwal R, James KS & Subramanian SV (2021). Trends in underweight, stunting, and wasting prevalence and inequality among children under three in Indian states, 1993-2016. Scientific Reports, 11, 14137.

Related journal articles I co-authored

Teufel F, Geldsetzer P, Manne-Goehler J, Karlsson O, Koncz V, Deckert A, Theilmann M, Marcus ME, Ebert C, Seiglie JA, Agoudavi K, Andall-Brereton G, Gathecha G, Gurung MS, Guwatudde D, Houehanou C, Hwalla N, Kagaruki GB, Karki KB, Labadarios D, Martins JS, Msaidie M, Norov B, Sibai AM, Sturua L, Tsabedze L, Wesseh CS, Davies J, Atun R, Vollmer S, Subramanian SV, Bärnighausen T, Jaacks LM & De Neve JW (2020). Analysis of Attained Height and Diabetes Among 554,122 Adults Across 25 Low- and Middle-Income Countries. Diabetes Care, 43(10), pp. 2403-2410.

Journal correspondence and comments I co-authored

Subramanian SV, Khailkar A & Karlsson O (2023). Should India adopt a country-specific growth reference to measure undernutrition among its children? The Lancet Regional Health - Southeast Asia, 9. [Comment]

Subramanian SV, Karlsson O & Kim R (2022). Using height-adjusted stunting prevalence will fail disadvantaged children worldwide, authors reply. The Lancet Global Health, 10(5), e621. [Correspondence]

Subramanian SV, Karlsson O & Kim R (2022). Revisiting the stunting metric for monitoring and evaluating nutrition policies. The Lancet Global Health, 10(2), e179-e180. [Comment]