Why autism is rising

Back in 2012 someone asked me why autism rates were rising, and also why some families got lots of assistance and other families were never even offered help dealing with learning differences in their children. I wrote my opinion, which has not greatly changed since then. I wish conditions were more improved than they are; at least now autism therapies exist and can sometimes be paid for by insurance.

There is incentive on everyone's part to increase the apparent incidence of autism and related disorders.  Specialists get paid for diagnosing and treating it: the more treatment, the more pay.  Schools receive more funding as they increase their numbers of apparently needy children.  Parents receive benefits and helps with their children (and the dubious benefit of believing that whatever their child's behavior, it's not the parents' fault, which can lead to doing less to change the behavior).  Schools also don't have to do as much with difficult students, if those students can be labeled in some way; then it's not the school's fault or responsibility to change, either.  Schools do hire specialists, when required to do so, but they work with limited budgets, and since some of the children aren't that bad (and the school knows this), fewer things are done to help the children.

There's also the fact that conveyor belt schools, public or private, need to move everyone along in a timely manner.  Those who stray off the curricular path or who cannot keep up or who choose not to engage (bored gifted students, as an example) get left in the dust.  The school is ground between its sources of funding, regulations that would cross your eyes, parents who expect miracles on a daily basis, and other parents who cannot be bothered to do their part in caring for children but leave it all to the school.  Then there are parents who loudly object to what is being taught and how it's being taught, but who won't leave the school alone, won't remove their children, who demand that the schools be the ones to change.

There is another issue: if a child is atypical, and is diagnosed as such, the parents are under an obligation to have that child seen and treated, whether the prescribed treatment is ideal or not, because in this litigious society, if the parents do not care for their child in a way acceptable to Child Protective Services, the children can be removed from the parents' home.  This use of government as a bat is a terrible burden on families; it makes parents much more cautious and unlikely to object to doctors' recommendations than they would otherwise.  There is increasing evidence that doctors do not know everything; there are other forms of help that may be extremely useful (diet, nutrition, exercises, different educational environments) but which can only be used as the powers-that-be allow.