21:46 Apr 02 2011
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Autism Statistics
Posted from eMedtv
Statistics On Autism: An Overview
Experts estimate that two to six children out of every 1,000 will have autism. Males are four times more likely to have autism than females.
Therefore, it can be summarized that between 1 in 500 (2/1,000) to 1 in 166 children (6/1,000) have autism.
There is not a full population count of all individuals with autism in the United States. However, using the occurrence data stated above, we can estimate that if 4 million children are born in the United States every year, approximately 24,000 of these children will eventually be diagnosed with autism.
Assuming the occurrence rate has been constant over the past two decades, we can estimate that up to 500,000 individuals younger than 21 have autism. However, many of these individuals may not be classified as having autism until school-age or later. Because behaviors related to autism are usually present before the age of 3, it is important to make sure the individuals are being identified and are receiving appropriate intervention services as early as possible.
Autism Statistics Compared to Other Childhood Disabilities
A study conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found the rate of autism for children ages 3 to 10 years to be 3.4 per 1,000 children, which is lower than the rate for mental retardation (9.7 per 1,000 children); but higher then the rates for cerebral palsy (2.8 per 1,000 children), hearing loss (1.1 per 1,000 children) and vision impairment (0.9 per 1,000 children) found in the same study.
Approximately 2 percent of children under the age of 18 have a serious developmental disability and these include:
Mental retardation
Cerebral palsy
Hearing loss
Vision impairment.
Of these serious developmental disabilities, mental retardation (or intellectual disability) is the most common. A genetic disorder often associated with having mental retardation (MR) or an intellectual disability (ID) that many people recognize is Down syndrome. Current information indicate that having Down syndrome occurs in 1 out of 800 births and is slightly less common than autism.
Approximately 17 percent of children have some type of developmental disability, including more mild conditions such as speech and language disorders, learning disabilities, and ADHD, which appear to be more common than autism.
While developmental disabilities may affect a child's speech or language, physical growth, psychological growth, self-care, or learning, children's health may also be affected by diseases that impact adults as well. A common childhood disease, juvenile diabetes, is prevalent in approximately one in every 400 to 500 children and adolescents, which is in a similar range of the autism. However, autism is more common than childhood cancer, which has a prevalence rate of 1.5 per 10,000 children (1 in 300 males and 1 in 333 females have a probability of developing cancer by age 20 according to the National Cancer Institute).
Public Education
In 2003 approximately 141,022 children were served under the "Autism" classification for special education services.
Autism was added as a special education exceptionality in 1991 and is now the sixth most commonly classified disability in the United States. The most common disability classifications in 2003 were:
Specific learning disabilities (2,866,908 children served)
Speech or language impairments (1,129,260 children served)
Mental retardation (582,663 children served)
Emotional disturbance (484,479 children served)
Other health impairments, which often includes children diagnosed with ADHD (452,442 children served).
While it is clear that more children are getting special education services for autism than ever before, it is important to remember that this classification was only added in the early 1990s, and the growth of children classified may be in part due to the addition of this as a special education category.
Summary
Although it is clear that more children than ever before are being classified as having autism, it is unclear how much of this increase is due to changes in how we identify and classify autism in people, or whether this is due to a true increase in occurrence. However, using our current standards, the autism spectrum disorders are the second most common serious developmental disability after mental retardation/intellectual impairment, but are still less common than other conditions that affect children's development, such as speech and language impairments, learning disabilities, and ADHD.
The impact of having a developmental disability is immense for the families affected and for the community services that provide intervention and support for these families. It is important that we treat common developmental disabilities as conditions of urgent public health concern, do all we can to identify children's learning needs, and begin intervention as early as possible to enable all children to reach their full potential.
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