Sustainable Development Goals and Health in Islamic Countries

Abstract

Background: We aimed to reveal the relationship between the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and health indicators in Organization Islamic Countries (OIC). Methods: The panel data method was used in the analyses, health indicators as independent variables belonging to 16 Islamic countries with regular data from 2008-2021, and the SDG score as the dependent variable was considered. Results: A one-unit increase in maternal mortality reduced the SDG score by 0.0047 units, a one-unit increase in neonatal mortality reduced the SDG score by 0.27 units, besides these results no significant relationships were found between U5mort, NCD mort, TB, VAC variables, and SDG score (P>0.05). Granger causality analysis results showed different causal relationships and variance decomposition results show that the long-term explanatory effect of health indicators on the SDG score by approximately 23%. Conclusion: According to the empirical evidence obtained from the research, improvements in health indicators especially focused on mother and child health positively affect the SDG score in the countries examined.