Beyond mortality: Reconceptualizing health outcomes in evaluating the impacts of foreign aid

This article evaluates the impact of foreign aid on multidimensional health outcomes in developing countries. Using 26 indicators from the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDG 2 and SDG 3), the study constructs six composite health dimensions and analyse panel data on 131 countries (2000–2021) with fixed‐effects cross‐lagged panel models. The results show significant positive effects of official development assistance (ODA) on reproductive fatalities, burden of disease, and environmental mortality, but a negative effect on health system capacity. The study concludes that ODA alleviates specific health burdens but lacks transformative power to achieve long‐term resilience and sustainable development. The study recommends prioritizing health infrastructure and system building as a fundamental component of global development efforts.