The state leads the nation with the lowest rates of children in single-parent homes and children with out-of-work parents, according to the Annie E. Casey Foundation's annual state-by-state survey on the well-being of America's children.

Utah also boasts lower-than-average high school dropout, delinquency and teen pregnancy rates.

But infant mortality and child and teen death rates are on the rise. That contributed to the state's overall ranking slipping from fifth to ninth over the past five years.

Also, a growing percentage of Utah's 738,000 children are living in poverty, following a national trend spotlighted in the 2005 Kids Count report as particularly troubling.

Terry Haven, Kids Count project director for Voices for Utah Children, warns against judging Utah's downward slide too harshly. The Casey Foundation is using new data and some of the 10 measures of child well-being have changed, making it hard to compare this year to past years' rankings.

But Haven says "setbacks in several key areas need to be watched closely," such as the child poverty rate.

Utah's child poverty rate - defined as living in a family of four with an annual income of less than $9,700 - grew 20 percent from 2000 to 2003.

Also, Haven says, consider the following:

l Utah ranks 18th for the number of children from functionally poor families - 36 percent live in households earning less than $38,700.

l 65 percent live in households that spend more than 30 percent of their income on housing, compared to 60 percent nationally.

"This says we have a lot of children living marginally on the edge, where a family emergency could send them tumbling," said Haven.

The report stresses that kids from poor families are more likely to fall ill, fail in school, become teenage parents and get into trouble with the law. As a result, they miss out on the education and other tools to climb out of poverty as adults.

Data used by "Kids Count" authors is two years old and spans an economic slump that appears to have run its course. But Helen Thatcher, welfare director for Utah's Department of Workforce Services, says it typically takes 10 to 18 months for the benefits of a recovery to trickle down to low-income workers.

Thatcher called the study timely, in light of a pending federal revamp of welfare-to-work rules that low-income advocates say will make it harder for welfare parents to earn a high school diploma or college degree. Education has long been proven to lead to financial stability.

Utah's worst score is its child death rate of 23 per 100,000 children - up from 20 deaths in 2000, placing the state 26th nationally.

State health officials calculate that represents 15 more deaths, but can find no statistically relevant explanations for the increase. They say the same for Utah's creeping teen death and infant mortality rates, which each grew 8 percent.

"You could have one van full of kids die in a car crash and bump up the numbers," explained injury prevention coordinator Cyndi Bemis.

The state's graduated driver license law, restricting the number and ages of passengers with young drivers, wasn't in effect at the time of the study. But Haven calls for stricter highway safety laws that would make failure to buckle up or wear a motorcycle helmet a primary offense, allowing officers to pull over and ticket such drivers without evidence of other offenses.

Nationally, injuries from car crashes are one of the leading causes of death for all children over age 1.

Utah also continues to have one of the highest teen suicide rates, especially for male teens.

"We don't know why. We wish we did. Some of it has been tied to drug abuse and criminal behavior," said Bemis.

One bright spot: Utah's teen dropout rate hasn't budged, even as it soars nationally. Also, Utah reports fewer teen pregnancies and low-birth-weight babies born.

And when it comes to intact families, Utah fares better than any other state, with the lowest rate of children (14 percent) from single-parent homes. That's a 29 percent improvement over 2000.

"Divorce is on the rise, but it appears we remarry," said Haven.

kstewart@sltrib.com