India Fact of the Day

From Charles Kenny's Getting Better:

In India, the percentage of parents who think the correct treatment for a child with diarrhea is to reduce the amount they are given to drink (absolutely the wrong thing to do) varies considerably from state to state. Fewer than 5 percent give this wrong answer in states like Kerala, where we have seen that health outcomes are very strong. Above 50 percent suggest this response in West Bengal—where child mortality in the 1990s was about three times as high as in Kerala.

I assume something similar happens in the US context. Literate people with Internet access and the knowledge that the Mayo Clinic's website is a font of credible personal health information have a substantial edge over those lacking those things, health-wise.