Hmong and other Asian origins (Baer and Ackerman, 1988; Yaish et al., 1992).

In an analysis of 136 Rhode Island census tracts, lead levels greater than 10 µg/dL were reported in 30 to 60 percent of children residing in census tracts with a high proportion (20 percent) of Hispanic immigrants, compared with elevated levels in less than 10 percent of children in census tracts with few immigrants (Sargent, 1997).

For migrant farmworkers, pesticides are an ever-present danger, with 1.2 billion pounds of pesticides used in U.S. agriculture annually. The Environmental Protection Agency estimates that as many as 300,000 farmworkers suffer from pesticide-related illnesses or injuries each year (U.S. General Accounting Office, 1992). One New York study found that one-third of the children interviewed who had worked in agriculture the previous year had been injured by pesticides during that time period (U.S. General Accounting Office, 1992). As harvesters, children encounter pesticide residues on crops. When children and adolescents eat, drink, or smoke in the fields, they ingest additional pesticides. And youngsters often are exposed to direct spray or drift while working in the fields or at home in adjacent migrant labor camps. These chemicals may cause acute ailments such as skin rashes, eye irritation, flu-like symptoms, and sometimes even death. They may also cause chronic harms such as birth defects, sterility, neurological damage, liver and kidney disease, and cancer (Wilk, 1993). Children are more likely to be harmed by pesticide exposures than are adults because they have lower body weight, higher metabolism, and immature immune and neurological systems (National Research Council, 1993).

Nutritional status is determined by measurements of children's height, weight, and dietary intake, as well as by biochemical parameters such as serum iron (Dwyer, 1991). Overall, the nutritional status of foreign-born children upon entering this country is directly related to their socioeconomic circumstances in the country of origin. Those who were better off in their home countries grow appropriately, and those who were living in pov-