Summary
This 2024 fact sheet from Children’s Partnership provides an overview of key child health facts in California and nationally to inform the work that must be done to raise healthy, thriving children in California. This publications uses 2017–2021 California Health Interview Survey (CHIS) data.
Key points include:
• Population: 4,013,000 or nearly half (46%) of California’s 9 million children are part of immigrant families, almost all are U.S. citizens. One in 5 (20%) California children live in mixed-status families.
• Food Access: Immigrants feed California and the nation, making up 63% of workers in California’s agricultural industry. Yet children of immigrants struggle to access the food they need to develop and grown health.
• Food Insecurity: 276,000 U.S. citizen children with non-U.S. citizen parents in California lost access to critical food benefits between 2016 and 2019, a period of heightened anti-immigrant policies and enforcement under the Trump administration.
• Language Access: Of all people enrolled in Medi-Cal, 43% speak only Spanish and 30% speak only Chinese.
• Mental Health: 13% of non-citizen children said they needed health for emotional or mental health issues. Yet 91% never received any psychological or emotional counseling.