by Brenda Baletti, Ph.D., Childrens Health Defense:
Overall, the prevalence of autism in U.S. children rose approximately 17% between 2020 and 2022, continuing a decades-long trend, the CDC said in its latest study, published today. The number for boys was 1 in 20 overall and as high as 1 in 12.5 in California.
An estimated 1 in 31 (3.22%) 8-year-old children had an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) diagnosis in 2022 — up from 1 in 36 (2.8%) in 2020, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said in its latest study, published today.
Overall, the prevalence of autism in U.S. children rose approximately 17% between 2020 and 2022, continuing a decades-long trend.
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The condition was 3.4 times more prevalent among boys than girls — 1 in 20 for boys overall and as high as 1 in 12.5 in California. ASD rates were lower among White children than among Asian/Pacific Islander, Black, Hispanic and multiracial children, continuing a pattern that first emerged in 2020.
“The 1 in 31 number is a testament to the failure of the medical system as we know it,” said Mary Holland, CEO of Children’s Health Defense.
Holland added:
“The level of autism among 8-year-olds has been steadily increasing for decades without unbiased, real research into the likely causes. Tens of thousands of parents have come forward in recent decades to say they believe vaccines triggered their children’s autism. Yet mainstream science, media and government regulators have rejected the idea of even examining this observation seriously.”
However, Holland praised efforts by U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to study the problem.
“The only good news here is that we finally have a president and HHS secretary truly committed to looking at all the potential causes and stopping this downward trajectory that is putting our nation at risk,” Holland said.
Kennedy announced in a Cabinet meeting last week that the government has launched a “massive testing and research effort” to determine what causes autism. He said the effort involves hundreds of scientists globally and will be completed by September. Once the environmental causes of autism are identified, “We’ll be able to eliminate those exposures,” Kennedy said.
Commenting today on the CDC report, Kennedy said: “The autism epidemic has now reached a scale unprecedented in human history because it affects the young. The risks and costs of this crisis are a thousand times more threatening to our country than COVID-19. Autism is preventable and it is unforgivable that we have not yet identified the underlying causes. We should have had these answers 20 years ago.”
‘This is beyond an epidemic’
The CDC study is based on data from the Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring (ADDM) Network, which has used health and education data since 2000 to track autism rates among 8- and 4-year-olds at multiple sites across the country.
The CDC releases a report on the data every two years. The 2022 data come from 16 sites across the country.
Since the CDC started collecting the data, prevalence estimates have skyrocketed from 1 in 150 in 2000 to today’s estimate of 1 in 31 children.
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