The report, prepared by the Federal Interagency Forum on Child and Family Statistics, includes 6 contextual measures that describe the changing population and family context in which children are living and 23 indicators of well-being in the areas of economic security, health, behavior and social environment, and education. This year, a special feature is included on children who have difficulty performing everyday activities. Hispanic children slightly outnumber black, non-Hispanic children. These shifts reflect a growing income disparity among children. Most American children and adolescents had a diet that was poor or needed improvement in 1996.
Teenagers are also less likely than younger children to have a usual source of medical care.
The increase in low birth weight is partly due to the rising number of twin and other multiple births. While the mortality rate for almost all groups of children continues to fall, it has fallen most dramatically among black children ages 1 to 4, from 67.6 per 100,000 in 1996 to 59.2 in 1997, according to preliminary data. This rate, however, remains almost twice the rate for whites, at 31.5 per 100,000 according to 1997 preliminary data. Death rates among adolescents, particularly among black males, have dropped dramatically after rising rapidly during the early 1990s. In 1996, the adolescent firearm mortality rate was at the lowest point since 1989, for both blacks and whites.