How Much Schizophrenia Do Famines Cause?

Ó Gráda, Cormac and Lee, Chihua and Lumey, L. H. (2023): How Much Schizophrenia Do Famines Cause?

Abstract

ABSTRACT: Since the 1970s, famines have been widely invoked as natural experiments in research into the long-term impact of foetal exposure to nutritional shocks. That research has produced compelling evidence for a robust link between foetal exposure and the odds of developing schizophrenia. However, the implications of that research for the human cost of famines in the longer run has not been investigated. We address the connection between foetal origins and schizophrenia with that question in mind. The impact turns out to be very modest – much less than one per cent of the associated famine death tolls – across a selection of case studies.

• Item Type: MPRA Paper
• Language: English
• Keywords: famine, schizophrenia, foetal origins
• Subjects: I - Health, Education, and Welfare > I1 - Health > I10 - General; I - Health, Education, and Welfare > I1 - Health > I15 - Health and Economic Development; J - Labor and Demographic Economics > J1 - Demographic Economics; N - Economic History > N0 - General

References

Almond, D. & Currie, J. 2011. ‘Killing Me Softly: The Fetal Origins Hypothesis’, Journal of Economic Literature, 25(3): 153-72.

Applebaum, A. 2017. Red Famine: Stalin’s War on Ukraine. London: Allen Lane.

Banister, J. & Hill, K. 2004. ‘Mortality in China 1964–2000’, Population Studies, 58(1): 55-75.

Barber, J. & Djeniskevich, A. 2005. Eds. Life and Death in Besieged Leningrad, 1941-44. London: Palgrave Macmillan.

Brown, A. S., van Os, J, Driessens, C, Hoek, H. W. & Susser, E. S. 2000. Further evidence of relation between prenatal famine and major affective disorder. American Journal of Psychiatry. 157: 190–95.

Chan, K. Y., Zhao, F. F., Meng, S, Demaio. A. R. et al. 2015. Prevalence of schizophrenia in China between 1990 and 2010. Journal of Global Health. 5(1):010410. doi: 10.7189/jogh.05.010410.

Cherepenina, N. 2005a. The demographic situation and healthcare on the eve of war, in Barber and Djeniskevich, Life and Death, pp. 13-27.

Cherepenina, N. 2005b. Assessing the scale of famine and death in the besieged city, in Barber and Djeniskevich, Life and Death, pp. 28-70.

Davies. R. W. & Wheatcroft, S. G. 2004. The Years of Hunger: Soviet Agriculture, 1931–1933. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

De Zwarte, I. 2020. The Hunger Winter: Fighting Famine in the Occupied Netherlands, 1944-1945. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Diamond, Jared. 2000. ‘War babies’, in Stephen J. Ceci and Wendy M. Williams, eds. The Nature-Nurture Debate: The Essential Readings. New York: WileyBlackwell, pp. 14-22.

Ekamper, P., Bijwaard, G., van Poppel. F., & Lumey, L. H. 2017. War-related excess mortality in The Netherlands, 1944-45: new estimates of famine- and non-famine-related deaths from national death records, Historical Methods, 50(2): 113-128.

Getty J. A., Rittersporn, G. T., & Zemskov, V. N. 1993. ‘Victims of the Soviet Penal System in the Pre-War Years: A First Approach on the Basis of Archival Evidence’, American Historical Review 98(4): 1017-1049.

Hakulinen, C., Webb, R. T., Pedersen, C. B., Agerbo, E. & Mok, P. L. H. 2020. Association Between Parental Income During Childhood and Risk of Schizophrenia Later in Life. JAMA Psychiatry. 77(1): 17-24.

He, H., Liu, Q., Li, N., Guo, L. et al. 2020. ‘Trends in the incidence and DALYs of schizophrenia at the global, regional and national levels: results from the Global Burden of Disease Study 2017’. Epidemiology and Psychiatric Sciences 29(e91): 1–11.

He, P., Chen, G., Guo, C. et al. 2018. Long-term effect of prenatal exposure to malnutrition on risk of schizophrenia in adulthood: Evidence from the Chinese famine of 1959–1961’, European Psychiatry, 51: 42-47.

Heinrichs, R. W. 2003. Historical origins of schizophrenia: Two early madmen and their illness. The History of the Behavioral Sciences, 39[4]: 349-363.

Hjorthøj, C. Stürup, A. E., McGrath, J. J. & Nordentoft, M. 2017. Years of potential life lost and life expectancy in schizophrenia: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Lancet Psychiatry 4(4): 295-301.

Hoek, H. W., Brown, A. S. & Susser, E. 1998. The Dutch Famine and Schizophrenia Spectrum Disorders. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology, 33(8): 373–79.

Human Life-Table Database (https://www.lifetable.de/Home/Index) (e.g. ‘Life Tables of Netherlands 1936-1940’, available at: https://www.lifetable.de/Country/Country?cntr=NLD)

Humennyi, S. 2019. Нелегальнi міграціi на кордоні між Республікою Польща та YCPР напepeдні до та під час Голодомору 1932-1933 (Illegal migration at the border between the Republic of Poland and the USSR before and during the Holodomor of 1932-33). Іctopiя (History) Issue 140: 18-23.

Kelly, B. D. 2019. The Great Irish Famine (1845-52) and the Irish asylum system: remembering, forgetting, and remembering again. Irish Journal of Medical Science, 188(3): 953-958.

Lally, J. and MacCabe, J. H. 2015. Antipsychotic medication in schizophrenia: a review. British Medical Bulletin 114, 169-179.

Li, C., Tobi, E. W., Heijmans, B. T., and Lumey, L. H. 2019. The effect of the Chinese Famine on type 2 diabetes mellitus epidemics. Nature Reviews Endocrinology. 15, 313–314.

Li, C., Lumey, L. H. 2022. Early-Life Exposure to the Chinese Famine of 1959–1961 and Type 2 Diabetes in Adulthood: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis, Nutrients, 14, 2855. https://doi.org/ 10.3390/nu14142855

Long, J., Huang, G., Liang, W., Liang, B. et al. 2014. ‘The prevalence of schizophrenia in mainland China: evidence from epidemiological surveys’, Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica, 130: 244–256.

Lumey L. H., Stein A.D. & Susser, E. 2011. Prenatal Famine and Adult Health. Annual Reviews of Public Health. 32: 250-251.

Ma, C., Yu, S., Huang, Y., Liu, Z., et al. 2020. Burden of Mental and Substance Use Disorders -- China, 1990−2019, China CDC Weekly, 2(41): 804-9.

McDonagh, M. 2013. Impact of Great Famine on mental health examined at Science Week’, Irish Times, 13 November.

Meslé F., Vallin, J. & and Andreev, E. 2008. Demographic Consequences of the Great Famine: Then and Now, Harvard Ukrainian Studies, 30[1/4]: 217-241.

Mokyr, J. Why Ireland Starved: A Quantitative and Analytical History of the Irish Economy, 1800-1850, 2nd ed. London: Allen and Unwin.

Moore, A. 2014. ‘Great Famine responsible for gene defect still causing mental illness’, Ireland Calling, 16 June.

National Bureau of Statistics of China. 2011. China Statistical Yearbook 2011 [http://www.stats.gov.cn/tjsj/ndsj/2011/indexeh.htm]

Naumenko, N. 2021. The Political Economy of Famine: The Ukrainian Famine of 1933. Journal of Economic History, 81[1]: 156-197.

Ní Nualláin, M, O’Hare, A. & and Walsh, D. 1987. Incidence of schizophrenia in Ireland. Psychological Medicine 17[4]: 943-948.

Ó Gráda, C. 1999. Black ’47 and Beyond: The Great Irish Famine, History, Economy, and Memory. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Ó Gráda, C. 2009. Famine: A Short History. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Our World in Data. ‘Schizophrenia prevalence, by age, 1990-2019’ (https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/schizophrenia-prevalence-by-age).

Priebe, S., Bogic, M., Ajdukovic, D., Franciskovic, T. et al. Mental Disorders following war in the Balkans. Archchives of General Psychiatry. 67(5): 518–28.

Rudnytskyi, O.P., Levchuk, N., Wolowyna, O., Shevchuk, P. & and Kovbasiuk, A. 2015. Demography of a man-made human catastrophe: The case of massive famine in Ukraine 1932–1933. Canadian Studies in Population 42[1-2]: 53–80.

Saha, S., Chant, D., Welham, J. & McGrath, J. 2005. A Systematic Review of the Prevalence of Schizophrenia. PLoS Med 2[5]: e141. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pmed.0020141

Scheper-Hughes, Nancy. 2000. Ire in Ireland. Ethnography 1(1): 117-140.

St. Clair, D., Zu, M., Wang, P. et al. 2005. Rates of Adult Schizophrenia Following Prenatal Exposure to the Chinese Famine of 1959-1961. Journal of the American Medical Association. 294[5]: 557-562.

Salisbury, H. 1969. The 900 Days: The Siege of Leningrad. London: Secker & Warburg. Smith, M. K. 2017. ‘Did the Irish Famine trigger mental illness in the Irish?’, Irish Central, 12 October.

Snyder, T. 2010. Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin. New York: Basic Books.

Song, S., Wang, W. & and Hu, P. 2009. Famine, death, and madness: schizophrenia in early adulthood after prenatal exposure to the Chinese Great Leap Forward Famine. Social Science & Medicine 68(7): 1315-1321.

Stein, Z., Susser, M., Saenger, G. & Marolla, F. 1975. Famine and Human Development: The Dutch Hunger Winter of 1944/45. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Susser, E. S. & Lin, S. P. 1992. Schizophrenia after prenatal exposure to the Dutch Hunger Winter of 1944-1945. Archives of general psychiatry 49(12): 983-988.

Susser, E. P., Neugebauer, R. Hoek, H. W. et al. 1996. ‘Schizophrenia After Prenatal Famine: Further Evidence’, Arch Gen Psychiatry. 53: 25-31.

Torrey, E. F. 1987. Prevalence studies in schizophrenia. British Journal of Psychiatry, 150: 598–608.

Tracey, P. 2008. Stalking Irish Madness: Searching for the Roots of My Family's Schizophrenia. New York: Bantam.

Vita A., Barlati, S., De Peri, L., Deste, G. & and Sacchetti, E. 2016. Schizophrenia. Lancet 388, 1280.

Walsh, D. 2012. Did the Great Irish Famine increase schizophrenia? Irish Journal of Psychological Medicine, 29(1): 7-15.

Walsh, O. 2016. ‘An invisible but inescapable trauma’: epigenetics and the Irish Famine. In Kinealy, C. King, J. & Reilly, C. eds. Women and the Great Hunger, Cork: Cork University Press, pp. 173-183.

Wang, C. & and Zhang, Y. 2017. Schizophrenia in mid-adulthood after prenatal exposure to the Chinese famine of 1959–1961." Schizophrenia Research 184: 21-25.

WHO. 2022. Schizophrenia: Key Facts. 10 January (https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/schizophrenia).

Yang, J. 2012. Tombstone: The Great Chinese Famine 1958-1962. NY: FSG. Yushchenko, V. 2007. Holodomor. Wall Street Journal, 27 November.

Xu, M., Sun, W., Liu, B., et al. 2009. Prenatal malnutrition and adult schizophrenia: further evidence from the 1959-1961 Chinese famine. Schizophrenia Bulletin, 35(3): 568-76.

Zimmet, P. Z. 2017. Diabetes and its drivers: the largest epidemic in human history? Clinical Diabetes and Endocrinology, 3:1.

Zimmet, P., Shi, Z., El-Osta, A., and Ji, L 2018. Epidemic T2DM, early development and epigenetics: implications of the Chinese Famine. Nature Reviews Endocrinology. 14: 738–746.

Zimmet, P., Shi, Z., El-Osta, A., and Ji, L. 2019. Chinese famine and the diabetes mellitus epidemic. Nature Reviews Endocrinology. https:// doi.org/10.1038/s41574-019-0300-9.