From the San Francisco Chronicle:

A report from California’s Department of Education has concluded that autism “threatens to overwhelm local educational systems” in the state. The department’s Autism Advisory committee concluded that the state lacks “coherent universally accepted effective educational practices” for teaching students with autism.

As a result, thousands of California families face a broad gap between what they believe their child needs to learn, and what the schools will provide to help their child. Experts don’t agree on what services may help children, and school districts vary widely on the types of services they offer.

Studies show that it costs $36,000 annually to teach a student with autism. California spends $8,558 annually to educate each student who is not identified as having a disability.

It is estimated that California schools transferred more than 30 percent of regular-education dollars to special education this year, up from 4 percent in 2000.

Another report, by the state’s Legislative Blue Ribbon Commission on Autism, concluded that the increase in the number of children with autism spectrum disorders “constitutes a public health crisis.”

From the [UK] Guardian:

The British disability charity Mencap is in the midst of “I Want to Work” week, prompted by statistics showing that only ten percent of people with learning disabilities in the UK have a paying job. The charity says that most people with learning disabilities want to work, but that polls have shown that most people in Britain thought they were unable to do so.

“To help people with a learning disability find employment, we need to challenge people’s attitudes towards people with a learning disability,” said Mencap chief executive Dame Jo Williams. “We want to show everyone how much a person with a learning disability can offer.”

Stephanie Meredith, past co-president of the Down Syndrome Association of Atlanta, sends a response to Leslie Roberts’ blog post: ‘When abortion may be an acceptable choice.’ Roberts, a Canadian newsman and television personality, had written that abortion may be an acceptable choice when a disability is diagnosed prenatally.

Meredith writes:

Far from adding unendurable stress, parents of children with Down syndrome indicate that the stress involved with raising a child with Down syndrome is lower than expected (Hodapp et. al. 2001) and that families enjoy positive benefits from raising a child with Down syndrome (Blacher & Baker 2006). In fact, research suggests the parents of children with Down syndrome actually experience a lower divorce rate than couples who do not have children with Down syndrome (Urbano & Hodapp 2007), and the siblings of children with Down syndrome are typically more compassionate and well-adjusted than their peers (Dykens 2005).

While the reasons for this have not been fully explored and since most parents would resolutely deny the claim that they are saints, the evidence suggests that there is something to be learned from embracing genetic diversity. (more…)

Says government is too quick to dismiss possible link

From CBS News, the New York Times and elsewhere:

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Dr. Bernadine Healy, the former director of the National Institutes of Health, tells CBS News’ Sharyl Attkisson that the question of a link between vaccines and autism is still open for debate. Her comments came as the United States Court of Federal Claims began another hearing to decide whether the vaccine additive thimerosal led thousands of children to develop symptoms of autism.

“I think that the public health officials have been too quick to dismiss the hypothesis as irrational,” Healy said.

“But public health officials have been saying they know, they’ve been implying to the public there’s enough evidence and they know it’s not causal,” Attkisson said.

“I think you can’t say that,” Healy said. “You can’t say that.”

Healy goes on to say public health officials have intentionally avoided researching whether subsets of children are “susceptible” to vaccine side effects — afraid the answer will scare the public.

(more…)

Lower evidence standard is blamed

Paul A. Offit, writing on the op-ed page of the New York Times, says the Hannah Poling decision relied on a relaxed standard of evidence, in which her parents needed only to propose a biologically plausible mechanism by which a vaccine might have harmed her. Earlier cases before the vaccine court were required to meet a higher standard: a preponderance of scientific evidence.

Without holding a hearing on the matter, the court conceded that the [Polings'] claim was biologically plausible. On its face, the expert’s opinion makes no sense.

… The vaccine court should return to the preponderance-of-evidence standard. But much damage has already been done by the Poling decision. Parents may now worry about vaccinating their children, more autism research money may be steered toward vaccines and away from more promising leads and, if similar awards are made in state courts, pharmaceutical companies may abandon vaccines for American children. In the name of trying to help children with autism, the Poling decision has only hurt them.

Paul A. Offit, chief of the infectious diseases division of the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, is the author of “Vaccinated: One Man’s Quest to Defeat the World’s Deadliest Diseases.”