Why You Shouldn't Listen to RFK Jr Talk About Autism
Most evidence now points to there being a genetic cause for autism, with environmental influences, but RFK Jr isn’t buying it.
Kennedy thinks that autism is caused by an environmental toxin.
Why You Shouldn't Listen to RFK Jr Talk About Autism
Which environmental toxin?
Everyone knows he is thinking vaccines, right?
Along with other misinformation he pushes, Kennedy doesn’t think that you could see a rapid increase in the rates of autism if it was genetic.
But that ignores the other factors that led to the rise in rates of autism, including:
broadening of the criteria used to diagnose autism — changes to Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) in 1980, 1987, and 1990 meant more kids would be diagnosed with autism. Before DSM-III, in 1980, kids were diagnosed with childhood schizophrenic reaction if they met Kanner’s original criteria for autism.
social influences — more and more parents sought a diagnosis of autism for their kids and services as more and more resources became available with the Education for All Handicapped Children Act of 1975 and the Individuals with Disabilities Act (IDEA) in 1990, especially that autistic kids could attend school. Kennedy didn’t attend school with anyone with autism because autistic kids weren’t allowed to go to school at the time!
classification or diagnostic substitution — as autism became more well known, children were more likely to be diagnosed with autism instead of mental retardation, developmental language disorders, specific learning disability (SLD), or intellectual disability, etc.
better recognition among parents and health care providers, especially as it became recommended that all toddlers be screened for autism
And it ignores all the studies that have confirmed these ideas!
“We found that in years in which the criteria for diagnosing autism change, it was more likely that an individual would obtain their diagnosis through diagnostic change. In the second part of the article, we engage in a thought experiment to assess the potential impact that diagnostic changes may have had as they filtered through the population. We estimate that one-quarter of the increase in measured autism prevalence is the result of diagnostic change. This of course leaves the remaining three-quarters unexplained.”
Diagnostic change and the increased prevalence of autism
While Kennedy calls it an “ideology of epidemic denial,” it is these anti-vaccine influencers who are in denial.
“I examined a historical dataset from the CDDS* and asked a simple question: for individuals born around the same time as Kennedy (and, thus, would be representative of the age of students at the “school”), how many are recognized as autistic compared to those with intellectual disability (ID)? The answer: about 1 in 20. Implicit in Mr. Kennedy’s logic is that many or most of these autistic people would have been at places like Wassaic.”
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Didn’t See Autistic People—But They Were There
They are in denial about the fact that there are many adults with autism, there are unvaccinated children with autism, and there are many studies that have shown that vaccines are not associated with autism.
“Most individuals with autism had been identified with pragmatic impairments in childhood. Some children who would nowadays be diagnosed unambiguously with autistic disorder had been diagnosed with developmental language disorder in the past.”
Autism and diagnostic substitution: evidence from a study of adults with a history of developmental language disorder
They are also in denial about the fact that they are hurting autistic families.
“Although autism has increased, there has been a steady and corresponding decrease in the number of children identified with the eligibility category of SLD. This “classification substitution” is suspected to be mainly responsible for the excessive increase in autism prevalence.“
An investigation of increased rates of autism in U.S. public schools.
And that they will be reversing decades of progress that has been made over the past few decades, as autism research, training, and services programs lose money that will now go towards his pet projects.
References
Rosen NE, Lord C, Volkmar FR. The Diagnosis of Autism: From Kanner to DSM-III to DSM-5 and Beyond. J Autism Dev Disord. 2021 Dec;51(12):4253-4270. doi: 10.1007/s10803-021-04904-1. Epub 2021 Feb 24. PMID: 33624215; PMCID: PMC8531066.
WATCH: RFK Jr. holds news briefing for CDC findings on the increase of autism prevalence https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/watch-live-rfk-jr-holds-news-briefing-for-cdc-findings-on-the-increase-of-autism-prevalence
King M, Bearman P. Diagnostic change and the increased prevalence of autism. Int J Epidemiol. 2009 Oct;38(5):1224-34. doi: 10.1093/ije/dyp261. Epub 2009 Sep 7. PMID: 19737791; PMCID: PMC2800781.
Hansen SN, Schendel DE, Parner ET. Explaining the increase in the prevalence of autism spectrum disorders: the proportion attributable to changes in reporting practices. JAMA Pediatr. 2015 Jan;169(1):56-62. doi: 10.1001/jamapediatrics.2014.1893. PMID: 25365033.
Bishop DV, Whitehouse AJ, Watt HJ, Line EA. Autism and diagnostic substitution: evidence from a study of adults with a history of developmental language disorder. Dev Med Child Neurol. 2008 May;50(5):341-5. doi: 10.1111/j.1469-8749.2008.02057.x. Epub 2008 Mar 31. PMID: 18384386.
Cardinal DN, Griffiths AJ, Maupin ZD, Fraumeni-McBride J. An investigation of increased rates of autism in U.S. public schools. Psychol Schs. 2021; 58: 124–140. https://doi.org/10.1002/pits.22425
Miller, J.S., Bilder, D., Farley, M. et al. Autism Spectrum Disorder Reclassified: A Second Look at the 1980s Utah/UCLA Autism Epidemiologic Study. J Autism Dev Disord 43, 200–210 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-012-1566-0