Latest news with #InternationalSocietyforAutismResearch
Atlantic
06-07-2025
- Health
- Atlantic
Scientists Are Afraid of What RFK Jr. Means for Autism
The annual meeting of the International Society for Autism Research is the closest autism science gets to having an Oscars moment of its own. When 2,200 experts from more than 50 countries meet up in one place—as they did this spring in Seattle—a kind of brainy excitement pervades, not just because of the awards given out (yes, awards are given out) or the chance for up-and-comers to network with top names in autism research, but also because there's always something to celebrate in the science itself. For two decades, studies presented at INSAR have shaped the world's understanding of autism. The buzz at the conference comes from the conviction that the work matters and that progress continues, sustained by an optimism that no nonscientist could undo. With one possible exception: U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. In April, shortly before the conference, Kennedy announced a major research undertaking. He promised that his agency would determine the cause of autism—or, at least, have ' some of the answers '—by September. (He soon extended the timeline into next year.) The effort, he pledged, would employ 'the most credible scientists from all over the world.' Now here those scientists were, all in one place. But none of those we spoke with had received the call to help, nor did they expect to. In speeches and interviews as health secretary, Kennedy has made clear his disdain for mainstream autism research, brushing aside the insights gained for this tremendously complex condition through years of research. Instead, backed by the enormous power of his federal office, Kennedy now appears determined to pursue his own long-held set of theories about autism: first, that we are in the midst of an autism epidemic (which is, in fact, highly debatable); second, that autism is caused by one or more 'environmental toxins' (which incorrectly suggests that environmental factors have not been explored); and third, that powerful interests want this information covered up (a conspiracy-esque viewpoint that lacks evidence). 'The way the secretary characterizes autism research,' David Amaral, the research director at the MIND Institute at UC Davis and one of INSAR's co-founders, told us, 'it's as if nobody's been doing anything for the last 30 years.' Amaral was one of more than a dozen veteran researchers we met with over the four-day conference, whose faces all went dark anytime we asked about the impact of Kennedy's muscling into their domain. They have been witnessing the health secretary bend the narrative of autism science in America. Their shared assessment: What he's doing is not good. The problem begins, in the researchers' view, with Kennedy's grasp of the science, which they say he either doesn't understand or refuses to acknowledge. For instance, Kennedy has complained that too much money has been spent studying genetic causes of autism, describing this avenue as 'a dead end.' Between sessions at the conference, the geneticist Joseph Buxbaum sat with us in an empty meeting room and sketched out on a piece of cardboard the numbers and timeline that demonstrate all that's wrong with this viewpoint. Autism's genetic underpinnings were first uncovered through studies of twins in the 1970s. Access to the human genome has now revealed that about 80 percent of the odds of being autistic are rooted in heritability. At INSAR this year, one of the most optimistic presentations focused on the progress being made toward genetics-based treatments. 'It is shocking,' Buxbaum said of Kennedy's apparent disregard for experts' input. Compounding the situation are the Trump administration's blitz of DEI-focused executive orders and DOGE cuts, which are undermining autism research. The Autism Science Foundation has been circulating a questionnaire asking researchers to report funding lost this year. Dozens of responses have been received, so far adding up to more than $80 million worth of halted research and pending grants that now will not come through. Jobs have been lost. Future discoveries have been postponed, possibly for good. Emily Hilliard, a spokesperson for HHS, told us in an email that Kennedy's team is 'fully committed to leaving no stone unturned in confronting this catastrophic epidemic—employing only gold-standard, evidence-based science.' It's unclear just whom Kennedy is relying on for scientific expertise; Hilliard did not address a request for more information about the scientists involved in the health secretary's initiatives. But Kennedy's singular view on the actual expert consensus seems driven by a personal goal: to implicate vaccines as the cause of autism. He now has reshuffled the ranks of the CDC's vaccine-advisory committee to include scientists who lack expertise on vaccines and have shared anti-vaccine views, and he has reportedly appointed the son and frequent collaborator of an anti-vaccine activist—one who long promoted false ties between vaccines and autism—to begin examining federal databases for evidence of such a link. Kennedy has long been a prominent advocate of this false conviction. A quarter century ago, the now-discredited British researcher Andrew Wakefield claimed to have discovered a temporal association between administration of the MMR (measles, mumps, rubella) vaccine and the onset of autistic symptoms in young children. Thus began a self-perpetuating cycle. The greater the number of parents who decided to refuse the MMR vaccine, the more the news media saw a valid trend story. Only four months after Wakefield published in The Lancet, MMR vaccinations had dropped almost 14 percent in South Wales. The fear soon crossed the Atlantic, and Kennedy himself brought further mainstream attention to the issue in 'Deadly Immunity,' a 2005 article for Rolling Stone and Salon. (Both publications later retracted the story.) Books were written about the supposed danger. Documentaries were made. Protests were held. It's hard to remember now, but up until that time, most people had never heard of autism. Almost overnight, parents everywhere became scared of the word, and scared of what a doctor's needle might mean for their child. This fear had obvious downsides—the stigmatization of autistic people as being 'damaged,' a drop in vaccine uptake broadly, a loss of faith in science, and a sense that something dangerous had been let loose upon the population and especially children. But something constructive came from all the attention to the issue as well. Parent activists jumped on it to pressure Congress to start funding autism research. The money began flowing in earnest in 2006, with a five-year $945 million allocation, and has since reached a total so far of roughly $5 billion, funding university labs and research centers around the U.S. The investment paid off: Autism became better understood. The vaccine question was a top priority out of the gate, and epidemiological research found repeatedly, exhaustively, and emphatically that vaccines do not cause autism. Clearly, however, RFK Jr. is not satisfied. When Kennedy speaks today about autism, it's as though the past 20 years never happened. It's not just about the canard that is being resuscitated. It's the language he uses to talk about what he thinks being autistic means. At a press conference in April, he set off a firestorm in autism communities when he described children with autism as 'kids who will never pay taxes. They'll never hold a job; they'll never play baseball; they'll never write a poem; they'll never go out on a date. Many of them will never use a toilet unassisted.' Tragedy framing, sorrow inducing—this echoes the 20th-century take on autism, when people with the diagnosis were too often treated as not fully human. Many were subjected to abuse and isolation (often by being institutionalized). After Kennedy received some blowback for his comments, he clarified that he was talking specifically about children on the severest end of the spectrum. Hilliard, the HHS spokesperson, told us that Kennedy 'remains committed to working toward a society where people with autism have access to meaningful opportunities, appropriate supports and the full respect and recognition they deserve.' She said his statements aimed to emphasize 'the need for increased research into environmental factors contributing to the rise in autism diagnoses, not to stigmatize individuals with autism or their families.' Nevertheless, the damage was done. Regardless of his intention, the ways Kennedy speaks about autism seem to miss how, for many, the prevailing narrative has moved on to more human framing, in which autism is not a disease or a tragedy but a difference meriting acceptance and support. His bleak terminology—autism is 'a disease'; it 'destroys families'; 'we need to put an end to it'—has left a mark. Amy Gravino, who is autistic and specializes in sexuality and relationship coaching, told us she felt shattered by Kennedy's comments. 'For the last 20 years, we as a community have fought against the rhetoric that RFK is now spouting,' she said. 'Everything we have tried to do to humanize autistic people has been potentially wiped away in one fell swoop.' Many parents, too, took offense at RFK's flattened portrait of their autistic children as a collection of problems and nothing more. The depiction leaves out everything about these children's worth as people: their capacity for joy, love, and creativity; their inherent dignity. 'If the world uses a lens that is only based on deficits and struggle rather than the complexity and nuance that is a part of any human being, including and especially autistic people, that makes true belonging really hard,' Sara Swoboda, a pediatrician in Boise, Idaho, whose daughter has an autism diagnosis, told us over email. At the INSAR conference, a pediatrician alerted us to concerns spreading among parents about Kennedy's plans to create a 'data platform' for autism. So far, the National Institutes of Health, the agency overseeing the platform, has outlined this project only vaguely, including that it would involve scraping data from all over the digital landscape—from Medicaid claims, private-sector health records, pharmacy chains, insurance billings, and even smartwatches and fitness trackers. It has not gone over well. The pediatrician shared some of the texts she has been getting from contacts around the country reporting that parents of autistic children were calling their health-care providers and pleading with them to scrub references to autism from their kids' medical records. Other parents waiting for assessments for autism were calling in to cancel. When we contacted nearly a dozen doctors and advocates about this matter, they confirmed getting similar requests from parents in their practices and communities. 'People are freaking out, and I don't blame them,' Alycia Halladay, the chief science officer for the Autism Science Foundation, told us. 'For the government to come in with no transparency and say we have the authority to take this data, that is scary to people.' They're scared of lost privacy, of seeing their kids stigmatized, of consequences related to insurance and job discrimination. But in a bigger sense, they don't want their kids marked, and scared of a comeback for those old attitudes about autism. Data collection in itself need not be a source of panic. It is, after all, the currency of epidemiology. It's how the vaccine theory was debunked and how the CDC determines prevalence rates. Usually, methods are put in place to ensure anonymity and ethical disbursement of the data. Hilliard told us that 'all NIH-managed databases follow the highest standards of security and privacy, with the protection of personal health information as a top priority.' Even if there's nothing to fear about this new database, however, good results in science depend on trust. That trust now appears to be at risk. Not everyone thinks Kennedy is getting every part of the story wrong. His clumsily calibrated messaging, though offensive to many, was appreciated by some families who feel seen by the secretary for addressing a segment of the autistic population that still gets minimal attention. These are people whose challenges range from moderate to severe and who, as Kennedy acknowledges, will never achieve real independence. The most challenged—assessed at roughly 27 percent of the autistic population in a 2023 study—are people with IQs below 50 or whose ability in the use of spoken language is minimal to none. Some in this group can also be violent toward themselves, and their inability to understand danger has resulted in their deaths with shocking frequency. They are people who require round-the-clock supervision, Especially for the families of such individuals, there is a deep frustration that most people no longer associate autism with individuals like their kids. Theirs is not the popular autism story. They get little interest from Hollywood, which best likes narratives about autistic people as fundamentally quirky or brilliant. Science hasn't shown much interest either, especially social science, whose practitioners find it easier to study people who can hold a conversation and complete a questionnaire. Additionally, parents who risk sharing details of the struggles at home can end up feeling like they've violated some sort of taboo, facing social-media pile-ons in which they're accused of dehumanizing their children by being explicit about autism's downsides. Kennedy was explicit about the downsides. In response, Amy Lutz, a medical historian and the vice president of the National Council on Severe Autism, wrote an article titled ' RFK Was Right: Severe Autism Can Be Devastating.' Lutz is the mother of an adult autistic man. She argues that Kennedy definitely gets a lot wrong about autism (for example, vaccines), but at least he is 'shining a light on the segment of the autism spectrum that has been increasingly marginalized by a focus on the most capable.' During our last full day at INSAR, we attended a luncheon sponsored by an advocacy organization called Profound Autism Alliance. Seated around three long tables was a group of psychiatrists, psychologists, pediatricians, and educators all involved in serving the marginalized 27 percent. That morning, they had witnessed a milestone in their field: A presentation at the conference had called for formal recognition and definition of profound autism as a new diagnostic category. (How widely this framing will gain acceptance remains to be seen.) Kennedy had no involvement in the presentation, but we asked the group about the health secretary's role in bringing attention to the profoundly autistic. There was, at best, some grudging acknowledgment that he had done so. But the researchers—whom we agreed not to name so they could speak without fear of professional repercussions—were much more concerned about the harm they feared Kennedy is doing, and will do, by parachuting, uninvited, into their realm. The risk, they said, is not just the harm to science, or potentially to their own work or the careers of those just starting out who may now choose something 'not autism' to work on. All of that, they told us, is secondary to the potential harm to autistic people and to those who know and love them. If faulty science takes charge and finds a cause that isn't a cause—such as vaccines—it will imply that the easy next step is finding the antidote to the cause. That is a seriously problematic proposition. For one thing, many diagnosed people say they have no interest in becoming un autistic. For another, a one-and-done remedy for the condition's most debilitating manifestations is, quite simply, a phantom goal. As anyone who has seriously studied autism will tell you, the condition is too complex. As one pediatric neurologist at the profound-autism luncheon put it, 'If I had that magic pill, don't you think I would give it to you?' There is no magic in science, which is why so many researchers think Kennedy's approach is an exercise in false hope. One thing the neurologist knows after years of treating children herself, she told us, is 'there's nothing worse for a family than to be given false hope.'
Yahoo
18-05-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Medicaid cuts threaten autism and lung cancer research, endangering health care for all
I pray that our politicians remember all of us, including some of our most disabled — but often overlooked — community members: those with profound autism, which has been defined by the Lancet Commission and the International Society for Autism Research as a person who meets the diagnostic criteria for autism, is at least 8 years old, demonstrates adaptive function skills significantly below age level, has communication deficits, tests at an IQ level below 50 and is unable to independently perform most activities of daily living with increased safety risks. I am deeply concerned over cuts to services including Medicaid. Medicaid pays for personal care, day programs, housing and therapy, which equates to jobs and keeping the parents of disabled adults employed. Many of us want to develop additional housing programs in Missouri through private-public partnerships because there are few options for adults with profound autism. I pray that we take into account the common good of all, including our duty to others. To remember the most disabled Missourians is to remember those who need our charity and our love, like my son Isaac. I pray we promote social justice and remember the more than 4,000 Missourians with profound autism who would be hurt by Medicaid funding cuts. - Julia Chaney Faughn, Macon, Missouri As a lung cancer survivor from the Johnson County area, I am deeply concerned about the massive cuts to Medicaid and health care being proposed by Congress. Taking away coverage for millions of people will jeopardize our progress in defeating this disease. All the changes Congress is considering to Medicaid — including adding work requirements and reducing funding for expansion, as well as repealing parts of the Affordable Care Act — would terminate health coverage when people need it most. I urge readers to contact their members of Congress and demand they protect health care. Visit to learn more and take action. - Ann Howard, Gardner Missourians came out and passed Amendment 1. We came out and passed the right for abortion and women's health. Did the Republicans in Jefferson City not hear us? Their constituents spoke loudly. Americans across the country are seeing our votes dismissed by politicians ignoring our wishes and not implementing our choices - Ken Henderson, Kansas City White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller's comment that the Trump administration is 'actively looking' at potentially suspending habeas corpus in the deportation of illegal immigrants is dangerous. (May 14, 14A, 'Trump's attacks on due process are a dangerous shift away from democracy') Miller's position clearly threatens democracy. Habeas corpus protects the civil liberty of everyone. Its suspension would be a slippery slope. What constitutes illegal behavior? Is it any action the administration doesn't like? Would it be illegal to give an undocumented immigrant a sandwich? My point is that criminal behavior must not be defined by the predilections of any administration. Abraham Lincoln, unfortunately, did not leave a good example by suspending habeas corpus during the Civil War, suppressing judicial dissent and ignoring judicial findings. But at least the Civil War was a real national emergency. That brings up a second point: Our so-called national immigration emergency today is dubious at best. Already undocumented immigrants who were otherwise contributing to society have been swept up and deported, without due process. Already two judges have been arrested. I hope Congress conducts an actual six-month National Emergencies Act review, as required by law. One thing is certain: This fails in the court of public opinion. - Gregory Ellermann, Kansas City I grew up in Rolla, the hometown of the very Republican John Powell, who cast Missouri's votes for Ronald Reagan in 1980. I went through school with his son. Mr. Powell would hire high school boys to unload boxcars twice a year for $10 per hour — a fortune in 1975. Rolla was also home to Mel Carnahan, Democratic Missouri treasurer, lieutenant governor and governor, who was posthumously elected to the U.S. senate. He did not return to politics until his children were grown. I was in Scouts with an older son, Randy, and a younger son. Rusty. I rode in his station wagon many times. I will never forget Randy, the first 'big kid' who paid attention to 11-year-old me. Rolla was a small town. I never heard one bad word about Mr. Powell or Mr. Carnahan. They were like everyone's dad. The Greatest Generation came home from World War II older, much wiser, with a little money and a dream. Republicans and Democrats were friends. They both wanted the same thing — to preserve the world order they fought for and that their friends died for. Things are not like that anymore. This is not normal. - Randall Jones, Independence Kansas City fails to celebrate its musical icons until they have passed on. People such as Tim Whitmer, David Basse, Millie Edwards, Danny Embrey, Stan Kessler and Rod Fleeman, among many others, need to be celebrated while we can still enjoy listening to them. And Lonnie McFadden, the multitalented phenom with a rich family history in jazz, should be named Kansas City's ambassador, the official greeter for any visiting celebrities. He is handsome, charming, well-spoken and kind. There could be no better example of what Kansas City is, where it has been and where it is going than Mr. McFadden. - James L. Mowbray, Kansas City
Yahoo
08-05-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Yamo Pharma Presents Statistically Significant Phase 2 Autism Results for L1-79 at INSAR 2025
Trial achieves unprecedented and clinically meaningful socialization gains in adolescents and young adults, addressing core autism symptoms currently lacking FDA-approved therapies NEW YORK, May 08, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Yamo Pharmaceuticals, a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company dedicated to treating the core symptoms of autism spectrum disorder (ASD), today announced positive Phase 2 results for L1-79, presented at the International Society for Autism Research (INSAR) 2025 Annual Meeting. The 12-week randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled crossover study (n = 58, ages 12-21) showed statistically significant and clinically meaningful improvements in the Vineland-3 Socialization Standard Score (VSSS) and several secondary outcome measures during the first period, while maintaining a favorable safety profile. The VSSS is widely recognized as the gold-standard instrument for objectively measuring real-world social skills, directly addressing a core symptom of ASD. Key Phase 2 Highlights Robust social improvement: L1-79 produced a 7.94-point advantage over placebo on the VSSS (p =0.01), nearly double the 4-point minimal clinically important difference (MCID) recognized by experts.1 Clinical global impression: Investigator-rated severity (CGI-S) improved by ~0.6 points versus placebo (p < 0.02), indicating a meaningful reduction in overall socialization symptom burden. Caregiver-reported change: On the Caregiver Global Impression of Change in the three most bothersome symptoms of ASD (CaGI-3P), families reported mean improvements of 0.48–0.61 points (p < 0.05). Favorable safety and tolerability: L1-79 was generally safe and well tolerated, with no serious adverse events and no trial dropouts with L1-79 due to side effects. 'These results are extremely encouraging for the autism community,' said J. Thomas Megerian, MD, PhD, Chief Medical Officer at Yamo Pharmaceuticals. 'Seeing nearly an 8-point jump in Vineland Socialization scores is remarkable. To our knowledge, this is one of the largest positive effects observed to date on an adaptive-behavior measure in ASD for any medication. More importantly, it represents a clinically meaningful change—essentially moving patients to a higher level of social functioning. For families and clinicians, that could translate to noticeable gains in real-life social engagement and independence.' Dr. Megerian added that both clinician- and caregiver-reported global assessments corroborated the Vineland findings. Trial investigators rated participants on L1-79 as having lower overall symptom severity (CGI-S), and caregivers reported clear improvements in their loved ones' most bothersome symptoms (CaGI-3P). 'These global impression scales matter because they capture day-to-day life,' he explained. 'For example, a parent might cite difficulty engaging in back and forth conversation, seeking friendship, showing flexibility, or engaging in repetitive behaviors or speech as top concerns—and on L1-79 we saw improvement across all of them. That kind of broad positive shift defines meaningful benefit in autism treatment.' L1-79's compelling efficacy may stem from its unique mechanism. The drug inhibits tyrosine hydroxylase, the rate-limiting enzyme for dopamine and norepinephrine production. Overactive catecholamine signaling has been tied to ASD-related social and sensory difficulties; by tempering this activity, L1-79 aims to rebalance circuits governing social interaction and communication. 'Rather than chasing downstream symptoms, we're modulating a core neural pathway,' noted Dr. Megerian. L1-79 is the first autism therapy to directly target catecholamine synthesis—an approach now backed by emerging research. 'With these compelling Phase 2 data, we are moving full speed into Phase 3 planning and FDA discussions,' said Chuck Bramlage, Chief Executive Officer of Yamo Pharmaceuticals. 'Our mission is clear: bring the first medicine that meaningfully improves social functioning in autism to patients as quickly and responsibly as possible.' About L1-79 L1-79 is an oral, first-in-class tyrosine-hydroxylase inhibitor designed to modulate catecholamine signaling. Preclinical and human studies suggest dysregulated catecholamines contribute to core social difficulties in ASD. L1-79 selectively targets this pathway to improve social-communication function. The FDA granted L1-79 Fast Track designation in May 2018. About the Phase 2 Study The multicenter, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, two-period crossover trial (NCT05067582) enrolled 58 participants (ages 12–21) who received L1-79 (200 mg or 300 mg BID) or placebo for 12 weeks, followed by a six-week washout and crossover. Due to a pre-specified statistically significant period-by-treatment interaction, primary and secondary efficacy analyses were confined to Period 1. Full details are available at About Autism Spectrum Disorder ASD is a neurodevelopmental condition characterized by two core symptom domains: (1) persistent difficulties in social communication and interaction and (2) restricted or repetitive behaviors and interests. Symptoms typically emerge in early childhood and persist throughout life, with wide variability in presentation and support needs. In the United States, the CDC estimates that approximately 1 in 31 children is diagnosed with ASD, with boys affected nearly four times more often than girls.2 No FDA-approved medications currently address the core symptoms of autism; existing treatments (e.g., risperidone, aripiprazole) target irritability and often carry significant side effects. About Yamo Pharmaceuticals Founded in 2015, Yamo Pharmaceuticals is a clinical-stage company committed to advancing L1-79 as a novel therapeutic option for the core symptoms of ASD. Supported by strategic partners such as the Autism Impact Fund, Yamo completed its Phase 2 study in 2024 and is preparing for pivotal Phase 3 trials. Visit for more information. References Chatham et al. Adaptive behavior in autism: minimal clinically important differences on Vineland-II. Autism Res. 2018;11(2):270-283. Maenner et al. Prevalence and early identification of Autism Spectrum Disorder among children aged 8 years—Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring Network, 2022. MMWR Surveill Summ. 2025;74(SS-2):1-22. Media & Investor Contacts Chuck Bramlage, CEO – cbramlage@ Eugene Prahin, CAO – eprahin@ Phone: (212) 610-1570Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Indian Express
06-05-2025
- Health
- Indian Express
Can heavy metals in toys trigger autism in your child? Here's what AIIMS study found
Imagine a toddler playing with her toys, running barefoot in the park, eating chips bought by her parents from the vendor and drinking water from a community tap that has been installed near a public sit-out. You wouldn't know that such innocuous activities would have exposed her to heavy metals like lead, cadmium, manganese, chromium and mercury. All of this heightens her risk of developing autism spectrum disorder (ASD), a neurological and developmental malaise that could affect her social communication and behaviour. An ongoing study from the All India Institute of Medical Science (AIIMS), Delhi, has shown how the environment plays a key role in autism development in children. The findings were recently presented at the International Society for Autism Research. Autism cannot be ascribed to a single inherited gene but is caused by the interaction of multiple genes and environmental factors. What does the child study say? Dr Shefali Gulati, faculty in-charge of the child neurology division in the department of paediatrics, AIIMS, conducted the study on 500 children with ASD and 100 control subjects, monitoring their blood, urine, hair and nail samples to study the impact of 21 heavy metals. While the hair and nail analysis is ongoing, high levels of lead, arsenic, cadmium, manganese and chromium were present in the urine samples of all 500 children with ASD compared to the control group. 'These impact brain development and IQ. It is very important to understand where they are coming from. Children play with toys or use paints which are contaminated with lead, are exposed to non-standardised batteries that power their devices, to cadmium that comes from their passive smoking, to arsenic, which is everywhere, including in water, and to mercury which exists in seafood,' she says. Jewellery, cosmetics, drinking water from old lead pipes or plumbing fixtures, household dust, even traditional medicines are all laced with heavy metals and within easy reach of the child. 'It is worst for children living near factories or waste sites, where both the soil and water get easily contaminated,' says Dr Gulati. Some of the foods which grow on this soil — whole grains, broccoli, grape juice, potatoes, garlic, apples and green beans — have traces of chromium. How is environment a risk factor for autism? Although some children are born with genetic triggers for autism, how they manifest depends on the environment. 'These factors include exposure to air pollution, pesticides, or certain medications during pregnancy, as well as maternal health conditions like obesity or diabetes. The advanced age, stress level and lifestyle of the father can impact the genes in the sperm and be a trigger of autism. We did another study where we found the gut microbiome of children with ASD different from that of their siblings, which is another area that needs looking into,' says Dr Gulati. That's why she is focussing on minimising environmental risks, focussing on heavy metals now. Earlier research has shown that children exposed to higher levels of air pollutants before and after birth were more likely to have autism. Other possible environmental factors include exposure to flame retardants, used in most home appliances and products to decrease the risk of fire. Scientists are also studying phthalates, used in plastics, soaps and shampoos among others.
Toronto Star
02-05-2025
- Health
- Toronto Star
RFK Jr. said his agency will find the cause of autism. These researchers have actually been looking
The annual meeting of the International Society for Autism Research took place in Seattle this week. The field's premiere scientific conference was scheduled to be held in the Emerald City five years ago, until COVID-19 dashed those plans. This time, U.S. autism researchers face a very different kind of crisis: massive cuts to federal funding, Cabinet members making false statements about the complex neurological condition they study, and a series of confusing and potentially worrisome policy announcements about autism research.
