Impact of Socioeconomic Status on Gradient of Visual Impairment among Older Adults in India

Priya Maurya, French Institute for Demographic Studies (INED)
Rajeev Singh, International Institute for Population Sciences (IIPS)

The present study examines the existence of an association between three socioeconomic status (SES) indicators -education, caste and wealth status and the severity of distance and near VI among older adults (aged 45 and above) in India. This study also identifies which indicator has the strongest impact on severity of VI among older adults. To fulfil the objective, the first wave of Longitudinal Ageing Study in India (LASI), conducted in 2017-2018, was used and bivariate and multinomial regression were performed. The findings show that higher educated older adults had a lower incidence of VI and severe VI was more prevalent among individuals from schedule caste and lower wealth quintile. The odds of severe VI were significantly higher than those with higher education. People belonging to schedule caste had the highest odds of VI across all severity gradients than any other caste group. Older adults from the richest wealth strata were 1.19 times more likely to have moderate VI and 1.43 times more likely to have severe VI compared to the poorest groups. The findings indicate less educated, disadvantageous groups and individuals from lower economic strata were more vulnerable to VI, highlighting the socio-economic inequality in health in India.

Keywords: Population Ageing, Health and Morbidity, Longitudinal studies , Inequality, Disadvantage and Discrimination

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