Children & Families

Diapering a child now takes about $1,000 a year on average. For families on the cusp of poverty, it’s a serious burden that can have lasting consequences on both children and parents.

Social advantages are tied more sleep and better quality sleep, says Lauren Hale, who has found differences in sleep patterns among disadvantaged kids as young as 3.

The idea that moms who take the lives of their children deserve nothing less than a lifetime of incarceration ignores what we now know about maternal mental health, writes expert Diana Barnes.

Ruben Castaneda of U.S. News and Cristina Londoño of Telemundo reported very different series on immigrant health. But both reporters had to win the trust of undocumented families for their projects.

Bethany Barnes of The Oregonian and Erin Schumaker of Huffington Post on how they tackled ambitious series about the impact of gentrification on health and children.

At Los Angeles Unified's 15 wellness centers and through in-class screenings, the district is stepping efforts to help students cope with extremely high levels of trauma and toxic stress.

Dealing with students’ childhood trauma may improve classroom behavior and attendance rates — at least that’s the idea at the Los Angeles Unified School District’s wellness centers.

Black infants in California and across the nation are dying at higher rates than infants of other races. Communities are responding to the disparity in different ways, with some forming groups to train more doulas of color.

Within California, there is an incredible variation in childhood adversity scores, from lows in San Francisco County to highs in Butte County.

This reporting is supported by the University of Southern California Center for Health Journalism National Fellowship.