http://elpasotimes.com/news/ci_3953762

Article Launched: 6/19/2006 12:00 AM

Mexican side of border better for kids than rest of Mexico

Louie Gilot / El Paso Times
El Paso Times

While some children living along the American side of the U.S.-Mexico border are worse off than those in other parts of the country, the same is not true on the Mexican side, a recent Mexican study found.
Children living along the Mexican side of the border enjoy a better quality of life than those in the interior of Mexico, according to "Una Mirada General a la Infancia en Mexico a lo Largo de su Frontera Norte," part of the Kids Count project.

There are 6.2 million children living along the Mexican side of the border and 1.8 million living along the U.S. side of the border.

Along the Mexican side of the border compared with the whole of Mexico, more children have access to toilets (97 percent versus 87 percent), running water (71 percent versus 52 percent), sewer (81 percent versus 72 percent) and electricity (96 percent versus 94 percent). The poverty level for children is cut by half along the Mexican border (24 percent) compared with the country's average (43 percent), according to the study.

In comparison, 40 percent of children living along the border in Texas are below the poverty level, compared with 21 percent for the entire state, according to another Kids Count study. The Mexican and Texas calculations for poverty levels are different.

Anna Aleman, the executive director of the FEMAP Foundation in El Paso, which raises money for hospitals and other health projects in Juárez, said proximity to the U.S. is a benefit for Juárez children.

"There is an exchange of information and technology and research. Preventive efforts are in place," she said.

The high industrialization of some border cities such as Juárez and Tijuana may also have contributed to more amenities for children, experts said.

Other positive findings of the report conducted by the Children's Rights Network in Mexico for Kids Count are that Mexican border states have the country's lowest illiteracy rates (3 percent versus 9 percent for children older than 15) and less overcrowding in homes. Children along the Mexican border tend to live in two-

parent households and in housing their parents own.

But the study, released late last month, also found slightly higher rates of older teenagers not studying or working (12 percent versus 11 percent) and slightly higher rates of teenage pregnancy (7 percent versus 6 percent).

"There is a tendency for women on the border to have their first child when they are still teenagers," said Gerardo Sauri, executive director of the Children's Rights Network in Mexico.

Louie Gilot may be reached at lgilot@elpasotimes.com; 546-6131.

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To learn more about the study, go to www.infanciacuenta.org.