An Immune Disorder at the Root of Autism

Opinion piece in today's editions of The New York Times by Moises Velasquez-Manoff, author of “An Epidemic of Absence: A New Way of Understanding Allergies and Autoimmune Diseases.”

In recent years, scientists have made extraordinary advances in understanding the causes of autism, now estimated to afflict 1 in 88 children. But remarkably little of this understanding has percolated into popular awareness, which often remains fixated on vaccines.

So here’s the short of it: At least a subset of autism — perhaps one-third, and very likely more — looks like a type of inflammatory disease. And it begins in the womb.

It starts with what scientists call immune dysregulation.