Very broadly, what are the biggest issues facing Hispanic children and families in the U.S.?
Ortega: The largest issues really are in terms of health care: receiving adequate health care, having opportunities to make sure immunizations are up-to-date, having regular checkups, and dental services. And education is highly problematic. The dropout rate for the Latino population is still growing, while for African-Americans and white Caucasians, we’ve seen a steady decline. Also mental health and help-seeking. If you were to look at risk factors that confront Latinos, you’d expect the request for mental health services to be higher because of the conditions, but the data doesn’t support that. Suleiman: Another issue is that Latina girls have the highest rate of pregnancy. This is one of the things we struggle with, because so many of the data are presented in a black and white fashion. When you look at averages, you see teen pregnancy down for nation. But that’s not true for Latina girls. One thing we struggle with is to get accurate stats on our kids and families, no matter what
