I just completed an interview with a radio station in New York. Unfortunately, we ran out of time and I was not able to discuss the most recent development, regarding autism, and what the new change may or may not bring about. As if we do not already have enough confusion about autism, where the rate of occurrence has been set at 1 in 150 births (that is the figure I used in my soon-to-be-released book, The Autism Handbook), a new figure has just been released by the CDC. They announced that their findings are now that one in every one hundred births the child will be diagnosed with autism. One in one hundred – that is really a scary figure. In another finding they are claiming that 40 percent of children diagnosed with autism disorders no longer have autism. My question is this: were they cured? If so, how?
It seems to me that the CDC is making an announcement, which I find very premature, that will have a major impact on the autistic child, the family, schools, and so forth. Will there be additional money available to serve these new statistics or will the present budget be the only money available to meet all those diagnosed with autism and their needs? Will the schools have sufficient funding to hire new classroom teachers to meet the needs of these children? The questions go on and on – my concern, are there any answers?
The Autism Handbook was written with the intent of supplying parents with some fighting gear as well as offer them hope. Hope seems to dwindle with these new figures, particularly for pregnant women and parents with young children.
The bottom line to all of this – please do not buy into these new figures just yet. Maybe they are correct but maybe they are not. Why, you ask? Here is where I have a real concern: this information is based on a telephone survey involving more than 78,000 parents of children in the age group from 3 to 17. There were numerous other questions asked about health issues, having nothing to do with autism. This new survey, ladies and gentlemen, included two questions on autism.
The results of this survey were released early this week. I have not heard anything on the news reporting the changed figures. I have not read anything in the newspaper. I do not understand this because these new numbers will have an impact on America as a whole.
Until next time...
