To deny health services to immigrant and poor children or to raise the eligibility age for Social Security benefits may be ill-advised public policy, based on a new study of ethnic trends in mortality in California from 1970 to 1990. The study, to be published this month in the journal The Gerontologist, shows that most of the age differences in overall mortality among ethnic groups stem from infant and youth mortality, says Carolyn Aldwin, senior author and a UC Davis associate professor of human development and family studies. "Interventions in early childhood would substantially decrease the differences in death rates among ethnic groups and argues for expanding, rather than contracting, services to these groups," Aldwin says. Proposals to raise Social Security eligibility to 70 might make certain ethnic groups less willing to pay in, given that their average younger ages at death means many would not receive the benefits, Aldwin says. At the same time, because people in general are living longer, access to preventative medicine and programs to promote health and reduce health-care costs will be even more important across all socioeconomic and ethnic groups, the study suggests.