From The Albany Times Union, a column by Dr. Terry Hamlin, chief of staff at The Center for Discovery in Harris, Sullivan County, and head of the Discovery School for children with autism.
The numbers released late last month by the Centers for Disease Control
showing a significant increase in the prevalence of autism among
children are sure to cause alarm and controversy. With 1 in every 88
children now being diagnosed with autism, we are confronted with what
amounts to an epidemic and the greatest public health threat to our
children, outpacing obesity and diabetes.
However, with obesity
and diabetes, at least we know the general causes, we have good medical
diagnostics and measures and we can formulate viable solutions. But with
autism, we are mostly in the dark. We have yet to ascertain its
origins. There there is no real consensus as to whether autism is one of
nature versus nurture — genetic or environmental — or a combination
of both.
The only thing that educators and service providers agree
on is that there is a growing population of very different children in our schools and in our communities who require very different supports from what we have available, especially for the more severely affected.
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