Breilh J, Granda E .Acumulación económica y salud-enfermedad: la morbimortalidad en la era del petróleo. [Economic accumulation, health and illness: morbidity-mortality in the era of oil production]. Revista Salud y Trabajo [Journal of Health and Work] (Quito); 1982 June;2:2-29.

Objectives: To systematize information and demonstrate the paradoxical effects that the increase in productivity and wealth, brought on as of 1972 by the boom in oil production, exerted in Ecuador, a country with a small-scale economy.

Methodology: Critical-interpretive methods, based on historical materialism.

Results: The authors elaborate upon a conceptual framework based on a critique of the political economy of the oil boom years of the 1970s and 1980s. The authors use epidemiological profiles to analyze conditions of health and of social reproduction.

They also analyze the relationship between indicators of productivity and economic growth and indicators of health and well-being.

By means of secondary data, the authors analyze the healthcare and economic situation of workers in different areas: mortality among the young and the general population, compared across five-year periods; post-neonatal and infant mortality by socio-economic regions and social class; and maternal mortality by social class.

This study demonstrates interregional migration toward zones of economic accumulation, tied to oil production; a marked increase in contagious diseases and in illnesses linked to poverty (from 61.7% in 1970 to 85.1% in 1977); a significant negative correlation between post-neonatal mortality and real wages between 1970 and 1977 (r = 0.83; p<0.01); a positive correlation between an increase in oil production and mortality from cardiovascular diseases (r = 0.91, p<0.01); and significant differences in infant mortality as measured by social class.

Conclusions: The authors verify the relationship between epidemiological decline and economic development based on oil production.