CDC Reports 1 In 88 Children Now Affected With Autism In the US 398
An anonymous reader writes "A new government health report indicated that about one in 88 children in the United State has autism or a related disorder, the highest estimate to date, which represented an overall increase of 25 percent since the last analysis in 2006. The Centers for Disease Control reported on Thursday that the rate increased by 78 percent compared to the reported rate in 2002. From the article: '"The CDC’s new estimate of autism prevalence demands that we recognize autism as a public health emergency warranting immediate attention," Autism Speaks Chief Science Officer Geri Dawson said in a new release.
"More than ever, these numbers compel us to redouble our investment in the research that can reveal causes, validate effective treatments and guide the effective delivery of services to all our communities," she added.'"
Is this actually due to more indecents of autism? (Score:5, Interesting)
Or are we changing how we mesure it? How we define "autism"? Maybe it's because autism is more acceptable, and doesn't require someone to be locked in a basement until a group of 1980s teens decide that they need to find a treasure in order to save their housing development.
All kidding aside, I'd be interested to know how much the autism scale has changed over the years. I realize that highly functioning people with autism still count as having autism, but was that always the case?
100% (Score:3, Interesting)
So once they all have it, it'll be normal right? Then we can stop overdiagnosing it and get back to life.
Re:It's misleading to imply these are new cases (Score:5, Interesting)
This is an important point to remember.
As an example: I was diagnosed with Asperger's in 2010 at the age of 37. Do I count in the statistics of 2010, or 1973?
"I had Asperger Syndrome. Briefly" (Score:5, Interesting)
I Had Asperger Syndrome. Briefly. [nytimes.com]
By BENJAMIN NUGENT
New York Times
Published: January 31, 2012
"FOR a brief, heady period in the history of autism spectrum diagnosis, in the late ’90s, I had Asperger syndrome.
I exhibited a “qualified impairment in social interaction,” specifically “failure to develop peer relationships appropriate to developmental level” (I had few friends) and a “lack of spontaneous seeking to share enjoyment, interests, or achievements with other people” (I spent a lot of time by myself in my room reading novels and listening to music, and when I did hang out with other kids I often tried to speak like an E. M. Forster narrator, annoying them). I exhibited an “encompassing preoccupation with one or more stereotyped and restricted patterns of interest that is abnormal either in intensity or focus” (I memorized poems and spent a lot of time playing the guitar and writing terrible poems and novels).
The biggest single problem with the diagnostic criteria applied to me is this: You can be highly perceptive with regard to social interaction, as a child or adolescent, and still be a spectacular social failure. This is particularly true if you’re bad at sports or nervous or weird-looking.
But my experience can’t be unique. Under the rules in place today, any nerd, any withdrawn, bookish kid, can have Asperger syndrome."
Re:Is this actually due to more indecents of autis (Score:4, Interesting)
Define "normal".
Whatever society at that time had constructed as normal. 70 years ago, if you lived in a rural area, normal would be getting up early, walking several miles to school, playing with the school kids, then walking home and helping out around the family farm. If you lived in a city, you probably helped out in your parents' shop, or watched your younger siblings while your parents worked. But the biggest factor in normality has always been, and more than likely always will, be a certain level of social interaction. This is because we are by our very nature social animals. That is why kids that are less social than normal tend to get singled out, or people get "weird" around asocial adults: it's not a conscious act, but rather a response conditioned by evolution and years of social cues.
Quest for a Cure, and other idiocy (Score:5, Interesting)
My son is autistic, and I can't stand it when people involve the words 'disease' or 'cure' when speaking of it. Autism Speaks goes so far as to use the word 'eradication', so I don't bother with them whatsoever. They want a cure for something, in my own opinion, isn't curable. It's the way you're made. There are no cures for Down's out there right now, are there?
And when it comes to the "OMG SO MANY AUTISTIC KIDS!" issue--I'm sure everyone here remembers the days back in grade-high school, where the special-needs kids were all dumped into one room. From Down's to ADHD, they resided in the basement where none of us "normal" kids ran the risk of running into them and giving us complexes. There were many, many children that were autistic, but they'd only get the colorful, cute euphemisms, like 'retards' or 'speds'. They were ALWAYS used with great care and kindness, of course. /sarcasm
Nowadays, more people are eager to look into each case specifically, instead of throwing a blanket over any kid that falls behind or shows some sign of disability. Therefore, we're all freaking out about how there are so many sudden cases of autism--to me, it's always been here. I myself am in the spectrum, but back when I was little, I was brought to 'retardation' tests to examine my issues (where they discovered that my IQ was actually strangely high). I consider myself an undiagnosed case until I learn otherwise. If you look around yourself, think back to all the kids you went to school with, the more you might realize that autism's always been there... we just haven't met it with the same speculation, sensitivity and care until now. Are there environmental factors? Perhaps. But I think that only delays our understanding of autism itself: we're looking for outside reasons, when it's inborn, 'just the way you are'.
My son is almost nine, doesn't use the toilet exclusively, speaks almost exclusively in echolalia (and in my exact tone and inflection, as I was his main caregiver growing up), has odd, brain-numbing routines (he'll sing the same three words of a song for an hour straight while hitting the floor over and over again in specific patterns)... but he is damned smart, scarily so. I work on meeting him halfway; he does, deep down, have great understanding, and as long as I accommodate the things he can't help, it works out. To be honest, he's one of the easiest kids I've ever had to deal with, and I was a preschool teacher for over ten years.
Re:It's misleading to imply these are new cases (Score:4, Interesting)
Which is a fair point, in this study.
All too many reports, however, don't discriminate across age clades, and just count up total Autists, if they specify at all. And they detect massive rises in Autism diagnoses since <whenever>, and you can't tell if adult diagnoses are skewing the results or not.
In this case, that they've accounted for the improvements in diagnosis rates is a positive sign... although I wonder how that "50%" number was arrived at:
A lot of Autists simply don't trust Autism Speaks. Most of its money goes to advertising and research into eliminating Autism (which Autists interpret as eliminating the possibility of people like us in the future, at the expense of research into treatments for the disabling symptoms of Autism for people who exist now). There is only one Autist on any of its boards (being John Elder Robison on the Research board, where he is outnumbered fourty-nine to one), and they have produced videos where people talk about killing themselves and their Autistic child and that they only didn't because of the "normal" child at home, in front of that Autistic child. (Just because they may not be able to speak normally doesn't mean they can't understand what you're saying.) Autism Speaks tend, as far as we can see, to be advocating for the parents, not the autistic children (which isn't a problem per se, except that they misrepresent themselves as speaking for the Autists themselves, something which is overwhelmingly not true), and advocating for more resources based on a campaign of fear and loathing of the worst case scenario, and misrepresenting it as the typical case. It would be entirely in character for Autism Speaks to underplay the role of improved diagnosis and overplay the "OMFG EPIDEMIC!!1!", as this plays right into their story of Autism being this Thing which will steal your child in the night and you need to give money to Autism Speaks if you want your child back.
That's not to say it's necessarily wrong, but I do not trust that unsupported statement from that source.
Problem with this... (Score:5, Interesting)
...from my 37 years on this rock, I've seen the descriptor of ASD go from savant to a whole swathe of "abnormality", from minor zoneouts (such as I have frequently) to total withdrawal (which I have in times of extreme stress). All have been applied to me in passing although I've never had anything like an official diagnosis. I used to act out at school, not because I was ADHD (as false a diagnosis as MSbP), but because I was bored: I had already learned what the teachers were trying to teach me. Problem was, as is common today, the school teaches at the rate of the slowest kid in class. I could think faster than all those kids, even the teachers, combined. So according to them I was the one with the problem - in a way they were right. They were holding me back.
It's not mental illness, it's a defence mechanism.
Back to the topic: ASD/ADHD/AS descriptors have become so diluted over the years, the terms could be applied to anybody. Have you checked out the standard mental health questionnaires? So full of leading questions, you couldn't say no to more than half of them - which is pretty much a guarantee that in any given situation, you could be assessed as having traits of some debilitating mental illness or other that would disqualify you from mixing in public. It's used in the UK on a regular basis to remove children from parents where in fact there is absolutely nothing wrong with the parents, yet one simple questionnaire that takes five minutes to answer ticks the boxes of psychotic, MSbP, NPD, ASPD, any number of "diagnoses" that immediately justifies the forced separation of families.
What we have now is those diagnoses being publicly scrutinised as it's now emerged that the assessments have been carried out by persons unqualified to do so [dailymail.co.uk], while claiming that they are qualified. Roy Meadow, Andrew Kawalek, Bruno Bettelheim, David Southall (just some names off the top of my head and I have extensive files on those and more) - all frauds, and provably so. Dangerous ones at that. All have had their hand in removal of many thousands of children from their families on the basis of fabricated mental illness. Southall does not even have a degree, yet he is on the GMC roll as a practising psychologist with license to carry out drug experiments on children. Gentlemen and ladies, I bullshit ye not [freeforums.org].
Re:Autism is bullshit (Score:4, Interesting)
Diet? (Score:5, Interesting)
My son is autistic. Didn't talk until 6 and still has lots of problems. The one thing that we did at 6 years old was to remove all diary from his diet. After this he calmed right down (used to take 2 strong men to handle a 5 year old), started talking, going to the bathroom on his own and various other improvements. The days he come home acting like his old self always turned out to be days when someone fed him diary.
Diary is one food that the vast majority of people can not digest properly. Especially certain races (my wife is Native American) and I've never felt good when drinking milk. This raises the question, does diet make things such as autism worse? I'm not aware of any studies done on it but there are quite a few people who have reported good results from changing diet.
The problem is the diary farmers have very good marketing and most people are convinced that milk is a vital part of the diet. They also have a powerful lobby.
Wheat is another one that may be worth some studying.
Re:Quest for a Cure, and other idiocy (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:More autism or more diagnosis? (Score:4, Interesting)
So the idea that people are trying to get their kids diagnosed in order to get more attention is rather an offensive one for those having to deal with the lack of support every day.
Yes, exactly. In our community, about 1 in 10 parents of autistic children are "adequately served" by the school system, most of them are locked up in "closet classrooms," typically portable units on the back corner of the property with their own separate entry gate and unpaved path to "their rooms."
Yes, we have contacted the Federal Office of Civil Rights, you see, if "some" special needs children are served in the normal building, and "some" normal children are served in the portables, then it doesn't meet their definition of discrimination. As you might guess, the portables are 90% special needs, and the main building is 95% "normal," which meets the Federal guidelines and therefore they will not come to investigate further on that basis...
Re:Autism is bullshit (Score:5, Interesting)
I like the limited conclusion of your first link. There is strong political pressure to find a reason to blame something that can be regulated, however tenuous the link. Politicians really want to be seen as "doing something" about this issue, because it affects so many people so deeply. If only we can blame it on some man-made environmental factor, the congresscritters can fight to regulate whatever it is and all be heroes (heck, it would be welome news in general). That makes me suspicious of studies that try to overreach in that direction.
The conclusion of "a disease of very early fetal development" seems strongly supported, and the points this paper makes about more general "environmental factors" seem reasonable, but I do share the GPP's skepticism of "let's blame chemicals".
Your second link is a sales brouchure, if I've ever seen one.
"Autism" has been the word for "I don't know what's wrong" for so long, and the definition keeps getting broader: once that term didn't include all mild retardation, nor ADHD, but was more speciifc to being non-reponsive to the environment, and high-functioning "autistics" of several decades ago shared a common tale of withdrawing from sensory overload, and difficult in processing stimulus that normal people took for granted. (That was certainly the case for me, though thankfully I eventually caught up, more or less).
Re:Autism is bullshit (Score:5, Interesting)
See... my issue is the term 'disease'. I can't do it. Even if I don't hold a doctorate in this, I don't SEE it as a disease. Disorder, yes--disease, absolutely not. So I automatically had trouble when both articles use the word. Maybe that's more feeling/opinion, but I don't feel 'diseased', nor does my son.
There could be environmental factors, but I think it's more genetic than junk food. I don't think the numbers have grown to the proportion people say it has when it comes to 'real time' and current environmental factors, because:
--Many of those 'new diagnoses' are people who were never diagnosed in childhood and are in their 40s-60s. The system's changed; as I said in my main comment here, we didn't explore autism as in-depth as we do now. Back when I was a kid, all the special-needs children were put into one group with no distinction.
--There IS, imho, an over-diagnosing going on.
At any rate, I'm not QUITE taking back my bullshit-vote. I need more conclusiveness. I put more stock into how we're made. But thanks for sharing and replying (and forgive me being glib/abrasive, I guess. I admit to being defensive on this issue. :P)
Re:Autism is bullshit (Score:5, Interesting)
Suzuki is indeed and unfortunately more of a PR mouthpiece than a real human being at this point (much less researcher); perhaps it would be better to say he illuminates the opinion of the research community by exploiting it to his own shallow ends rather than anything else. And yes, "disease" is a bad word to use; both pieces are dated (the first by age and the second by shortage of recent exposure) and hence prone to what today would be considered something of a faux pas. Make no mistake: it is improbable that it has anything to do with junk food, and Suzuki should have been shot for suggesting that. More likely culprits would be air and water contaminants, or perhaps some cocktail of food preservatives.
The word "autism" is also hilariously broad, certainly. One reason the diagnostic categories are expanding is that researchers want to understand the whole spectrum of attributes that go into making the really dysfunctional cases what they are. As my boss likes to parrot, almost everyone has one or more traits that would be considered autistic if they appeared in the right combination with other aspects; in fact, the diagnostic questionnaires (which you've probably seen) are scored by adding up the 'autisminess' of the responses, so even that is a spectrum. Of course, it's hard to take the news from a psychiatrist that your son has a surplus of autistic traits when they explain it like it's a disaster.
There's another confounding factor, also, in how the population of diagnoses has grown, besides shifting definitions and older people getting re-assessed: better-educated (as well as more paranoid) young families are more likely to seek diagnoses out in the first place. In retrospect there's probably too much interference to say honestly if the rate of autistic traits is increasing or not.
Re:Quest for a Cure, and other idiocy (Score:5, Interesting)
I was an absolute dork and not in the 'popular crowd', but no, that wasn't a factor (that I recall, at least). I was incredibly socially-awkward (or to be more accurate, socially-immature), but there were 2 or 3 girls that I'd play with on the playground that were as dorky as me, lol. If faced with bullying (which happened quite a bit), I'd end up getting really upset then do weird things, like picking the skin of my fingers and showing them, as if thinking "maybe they'll leave me alone if I show them this". I was easy to pick on, very sensitive and got taken advantage of by some of those 'friends', and when it came to recess and other "have fun" activities, I had a hard time containing myself. I'd put people off because I was loud, over-excitable, way-too-talkative, coming up with weird, imaginative scenarios that were all over the map, etc.... it happens NOW, as an adult. If I don't watch myself, I make people angry. What I do in those situations is take a cig break at work, escape to my car to relax, talk to myself and laugh at nothing if my emotions are overloading (I luckily work with people who accept me; I'm not that way every minute, but sometimes I really, really need to decompress and they get it, thank criminy).
The main testing came from my not being able to follow instruction/directions. My mom thought I was being defiant, when it really just felt like another language was being spoken when it came to certain lessons. I could read from the age of 4, but if you had a book on tape, I may as well be out of the room. That wasn't an attention thing, as I see it: I could sit for an entire day with a bunch of books, reading every one and being able to relay every detail--but one paragraph on a tape recorder and--"Huh? What?" I'm STILL this way.
I figured it all out once in college. Throughout my whole school history, I'd thought, "I'm bad at math and science." When I got to my first year in tech school and discovered I need not just Algebra I but II, I almost gave up. Then I was enrolled in a 'self taught' Algebra I course where I took the book home, studied each chap then went in to take tests in the computer lab. I didn't just pass, I aced it, while holding down two jobs at the same time. I went every night I could and accidentally fit BOTH I and II in one summer, as I'd thought we had to do the whole book when Alg. I was the first HALF of it. They let me finish the last month and a half with the second course--aced it. Two in one. I was half-elated that I'd discovered how I not only could do it, but find it ridiculously easy, half pissed-off that it hadn't been recognized earlier-on.
Wow, I'm Lil' Ms. McWordy, huh? Lol. By the way, I've seen your sig before and want to marry it. Where'd you get it? Can I haz one?
Autism rising/not rising (Score:3, Interesting)
My mother has runs a special needs unit of about 3 classes in a normal government primary school in Western Sydney for about 5 years and has been a teacher of "normal" kids for about 30 years before that. She is convinced that the percentage of special needs kids (autism, downs etc) as compared to "normal" primary school kids is rising due to advances in medical technology. She feels that 30, 40 or 50 years ago a lot of the kids she teaches would have died due to complications at childbirth related to their conditions whereas with better medical technology today more survive. This judgement is just based on her experience only. Whether its true or not I don't know but she has been teaching kids for over 35 years.
Re:Autism is bullshit; No, only the AC is ... (Score:4, Interesting)
This reminds me of a family my parents are friends with.
Their son was diagnosed with moderate autism at about age 10. Everyone that knew the kid wasn't surprised, he always had just a general lack of social grace. So he was enrolled in classes to teach him social skills. And for the year that he was in the classes his behaviour was vastly improved. You could just tell he was observing the situation and formulating a response.
The problem was as soon as he stopped going to the classes he went right back to being a little asshole. Except, when my mother was around. When she was around he was a pleasant young man, the moment she was out of earshot he transformed into a little prick.
Then there was an incident where my father played a practical joke on him. The boy was red faced and emotionally laid bare in front of everyone he held dear. Then my father puts his arm around and says, "See what happens when you don't listen."
Then it clicked for me. That's what dad did to my sister and I when we were being a little shits. He was the master of public humiliation as discipline device ("You need to listen to the advice I'm giving you, or else.").
Which meant that mom had a "We need to talk" moment with him (My mother has this way of being so calm she's scary during those conversations).
So fast forward to a couple of years ago. We're all at a 4th of July party. He's being a more of an ass than any 15 year old has a right to be. When we were away from the party for a moment, I used a couple of joint locks on him and got him pinned face down on the lawn. Then I told him point blank, "You're being a little shit. Stop it or I will get very angry." After I let him up, he behaved. Never had a problem with him since.
Re:Autism is bullshit; No, only the AC is ... (Score:3, Interesting)
Reading your insightful and articulate post about your own 'autism-spectrum' disorder really underscores to me how much of this issue boils down to a problem with semantics.
I've met someone with autism. Requires constant care. Blank face. Mute and illiterate. Likes to bang head repeatedly against solid objects for comfort.
I've met someone with Asperger's syndrome (my informal diagnosis, but not in dispute). Worked for the same company as me. Independent to a fault. Blank face. Slow but precise and articulate communicator. Calm, personable and helpful. Admirable intellect.
Clearly we are conflating things that do not deserve to be conflated.
Re:Autism is bullshit (Score:5, Interesting)
Perhaps he believes Autism is made up. It is likely psychological diseases are over diagnosed.
I think it's very likely that certain autism spectrum disorders are overdiagnosed, most commonly asperger's syndrome. It's like it is the latest trend in psychology to classify introvert intelligent people as having asperger's syndrome. I've come across more than a few people who function quite well in social scenarios that have been labeled as having aspergers where I seriously want to ask the question "Isn't (s)he just shy or introverted?".
The only person that I was quite convinced he had Asperger's was a man who really showed problems interacting in social scenarios. He wasn't a bad person, but he would sometimes make remarks that were inappropriate to the situation or the mood. He would often come off as rude and arrogant, insult people without realizing it, obsess over small details and maintained a very strict schedule that was nearly mechanical. I know that this sounds a bit condescending over the person, since the above factors alone don't necessarily give you Asperger's, after all he could just be a rude person who overly focused on the details, but if you worked with him for a couple of days you would get this feeling that something was slightly off.
I believe that in many cases people who go take an ASD test do so convinced that they've got Asperger's and will answer questions to skew the results in favor of what they were expecting. Any person intelligent enough can fairly easily subvert standardized psychological testing, and the people typically wondering about Asperger's syndrome are introvert intelligent people. As a part of a discussion about this topic I've done the first diagnostic tests myself twice, once normally and once with the intention of being diagnosed as having Asperger's, and it's needless to say that I got the results I was expecting in both cases. I think we have a lot more hypochondriacs than we have people with Asperger's Syndrome, and the initial diagnostic tests (often found online by the way) play into that by having people visit psychologists for at least 3 times to do an extensive test. The extensive testing here consists of a standardized series of questions (which are often the same questions worded differently for verification purposes), a logical test (including once again the tower of hanoi problem, which every programmer is familiar with) and another test, but I forgot what the third part was, each in a seperate session, followed by a session where the psychologist tells you the results. That's 4 visist guaranteed for everyone who takes the introduction test and manages to score high enough and become worried.
I also believe that it currently is a trend among psychologists to overdiagnose relatively harmless conditions such as Asperger's Syndrome and ADHD. The sale of Ritalin (for treatment of ADHD) has gone through the roof in the past 10 years here, with students starting a black market in schools because the drug supposedly helps you study better during exams. Many parents with kids that are underperforming in school take their children to psychologists expecting an answer among the lines of a psychological disorder instead of asking themselves the question if their child would rather study something different. After all some people just don't care about Latin or math, so it's no wonder they perform badly when their parents force them in that direction because of their own desires.
It's become all too common to hear people say "Well, he's not performing well in school, but it's because of ADHD", while he's been sitting there real quietly reading a comic book in the background for the past 20 minutes. It just reeks of "I pushed my kid in the wrong direction, and now I don't want to admit it, so I get a psychologist who told me it wasn't my fault. If he pops these pills he'll be fine."
Having said that, I don't want to downplay Asperger's Syndrome (or ADHD) or the standardized testing for it. I've certainly c
Re:Autism is bullshit (Score:4, Interesting)
I know my son would not have been diagnosed properly 10 or 15 years ago as autism spectrum. I certainly was not properly diagnosed as a child.
He appears normal, but querky. Would not look you in the eye, could not remember names, even of his best friend and cousins. Can pick up almost any musical instrument and make, if not music, a pleasing set of sounds from it. No interest in learning to play tho, just plink. Kinda sad, we have a semi-retired concert piano tracher down the street, she offered to tutor him for free after hearing him plick away on her stienway. Cheerful disposition at almost any time, is very charming and girls even a few years older just come up to him and talk to him. Hell, he was asked out on his first date by a girl at age 8. At age 9 he is 5 feet all, adrenal glands are in puberty, but not his petutitary. Very picky eater. He can do 2 position multipliers in his head, 4 digit add/subtract. At age 7. At age 8 he could solve for X with the four classic operators. At 9 he could perform 3 and 4 step math problems in his head. Not a math genius, but gifted.
Classic aspergers, an autistic spectrum disorder. Height stinky armpits and pubic fuzz aside, he appears normal. Aside from his natural attractiveness to the opposite sex, he is a typical geek.
Careful testing as revealed that he can store information in his brain, but it is hard for him to get it back out effectively. It is sort of like a bad hash algorithm...
If I tell him the boy work a red hat, a green shirt and blue pants, and then I ask him what the boy wore, he would say "I don't know."
Give him a key, and he can return the value. "what color was the hat?" gets an instant "Red" response. Even a day later he will retain and retrieve the color of the hat.
if you ask him what a book was about, he says "I don't know". Ask him about the boy in the story, or an event in the story you get near total recall, but he needs the key supplied to him.
Ask him to name ten Pokemon or bakugon no dice. Give him a name, you are buried in detail and stats and battle pre plays from a book or a show he has seen.
He can memorize 5 spelling words in a single pass. 8 takes him 4 or 5 tries. Give him ten, you are,lucky if he can memorize 2. Mind you, that ten cold be made of words he learned in two 5 word sessions, and he will not be able to recall the information, but we know it is there.
So all of his therapy is around socialization and how to build his own keys to his knowledge and socialization skills. They are all skills I had to build myself because I was never diagnosed until my 20s.
Now he gets some services for free, some we pay for, like a writing tutor. Autistic awareness has resulted in more autistics being identified and read, and that is a good thing.