Ethnicity and prenatal care use in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso: the independent contribution of neighborhood ethnic composition

Bassiahi Abdramane Soura, Institut Superieur des Sciences de la Population (ISSP)

It is known that health behavior may be influenced by cultural factors such as ethnicity. However, this impact is often seen as little visible in urban areas because the city appears to be a melting pot where different cultures materialized by their ethnicity come to merge to create a new type of community where ethnic group loses its role as discriminating factor of health behavior. With my interest in Ouagadougou (Burkina Faso), I would like to refute this latter conception. My paper will highlight the influence of ethnicity on health behavior in an African big city, especially on prenatal visit. It will demonstrate that beyond the influence exerted by the woman’s own ethnic group, there is an independent contribution of the neighborhood ethnic composition due to possible cultural transfers within neighborhood. It will also investigate the nature of complementarity and substitutability between ethnicity and woman’s education and standard of living.