Shocking the Audience with the Article, Autism Is a Serious Public Health Crisis

In the article titled “Autism is a Serious Public Health Crisis” Ann McElroy Dachel claims that the CDC (the Center for Disease Control) is hiding a secret which she calls “the big lie.” “The big lie” is a result of the CDC lying about the fact that more and more children are being diagnosed with autism or forms of the disorder because of an increase in mercury that is put into new vaccines. Dachel is well educated on how autism is affecting children because her own son, John, has a form of autism known today as Asperger’s. She acknowledges from the beginning that John wasn’t like the average kid his age, she noticed that “his talking and interacting with people began to regress” (Dachel, Paragraph 10) which caused her to take action. She enrolled John in multiple activities including speech therapy to help cope with the interaction with people, but yet he was still not being treated as equal. As time passed results came forward detailing why John was having so many problems with interaction. When he was in second grade John was diagnosed with being “possibly autistic” (Dachel, Paragraph 12) which opened many new doors for Dachel. She now knew that her son was in fact not like the other kids. 20 years later, after being officially diagnosed, John is a very well educated, not only in school, but instruments as well.

Offit, Paul A. Autism's False Prophets: Bad Science, Risky Medicine, and the Search for a Cure. New York: Columbia UP, 2008.

The debate over vaccinations causing autism is a very important health risk facing our country today. There is a misconception that these two things are related which this essay hopes to dispel. The current threat of unvaccinated children, due to parental concern over the risk of adverse effects from vaccination including autism or religious choice is a major Canadian health concern and results in misconceptions, outbreaks, and general false fear in parents.

The population being discussed are children and adolescents with autism. What once used to be considered a rare disorder is now a common diagnosis and is well known in the community. Statistics coming from the Centers for Disease control now “identify around 1 in 88 American children” as having autism spectrum disorder with the disorder more commonly being diagnosed in boys ("What is autism?" ). This does not mean that the actual occurrence rates have gone up, it just means that today we are better able to diagnose the disorder and there is increasing awareness. Although not many, there are some risk factors for autism that have been identified. These include gender, family history and those with other medical conditions such as Tourette’s syndrome and epilepsy ("Autism:risk factors," 2012).

People in today’s society hear more about autism and its prevalence in school systems than they did ten years ago. A study was done between 2002 and 2006 in the state of New Jersey to determine whether or not autism was becoming more and more prevalent. “For 2006, a total of 533 children with autism spectrum disorder were identified, consistent with prevalence of 17.4 per 1000, indicating a significant increase in the disorder from 2002 where the prevalence was

Every parent wants to do the best they can, and when things don't go as planned, they question if their parenting skills are good enough. When Heather found out her children both had Autism, she would compare them to others, knowing they would never be normal; always questioning why, and how they acquired this disorder. When her daughter reached the age of eight she stopped showing signs of Autism. Autism affects all autistic children in different ways. In this essay, I plan to research and find out more about Autism, the signs and symptoms and different spectrums of it, and if vaccinations cause Autism. This relates to my senior project, because I will be hosting a fundraiser for Autism and raising money to donate to the Rich

Ever since a study was posted by Ohio State University in 1998, a belief has existed that vaccines are a major cause of autism. Despite the fact that large amounts of research have been done to disprove this belief, the belief still persists. The research done in this paper were obtained by searching many science databases. These studies consist of experiments and result analysis. The studies included surveys, examination of health databases, and medical examinations. The experiments proved that vaccines do not have a causal relationship with autism. This is shown by multiple points, including information on the times of vaccines and diagnosis, and graphs and charts showing the relationship between these two. This is significant because it dispels the aforementioned belief. It also shows that people have been misinformed for years, something that must be corrected.

I chose this audience, because it the most appropriate for my argument about autism assuming that a child’s biggest advocate will be their parents. I hope this infographic teaches all parents of young children to identify the early signs and symptoms of autism and if they spot any of the signs and symptom outlined that they feel comfortable enough to seek out a pediatrician for evaluation. My argument offers comfort for a very real epidemic that we currently have no cause or cure for. I hope that my infographic offers hope that there are options and to embrace autism. The last section of my project places emphasis on this also the picture of the girl that looks like a puzzle piece was a great

An outbreak of the measles in the United States has sparked controversy in the autism world today. Contrary to previous theories, the measles vaccination is not a leading component to the cause of this disease. One in sixty-eight children in the United States are entering this world with Autistic Spectrum Disorder today, a thirty percent increase from the one in eighty eight

In a study conducted in Phoenix by the Arizona Business Gazette, researchers concluded that one in every 68 children in the United States is diagnosed with Autism before the age of 3. Autism is described as a “range of conditions characterized by challenges with social skills, repetitive behaviors, and speech and nonverbal communication,” (“What is Autism?”). Because of how present Autism is in our society, the topic has been heavily debated for years. There are many contrasting opinions regarding different issues on the subject of Autism, but there has yet to be an agreement on one of the most important aspects of the topic, the cure. It is profoundly disagreed upon whether it is ethically and morally correct for our society to fund and conduct research to find a cure for Autism because some think that it sending the message that we are trying to ”change” these autistic individuals. In relation to the information regarding neurodiversity and the autism spectrum, society should continue to pursue research and funding to find a cure because of the numerous ways it could improve the quality of life for those affected by autism.

In the past two decades or so, autism has changed from being a condition nobody had even heard about to widely recognized mental health condition. Due to widespread use of internet, social media and smartphones everybody knows something about autism. Just searching for autism in Google brings up more than 68 million results. Autism has become a matter of passionate national debate among different stake holders such as government, public health agencies, mental health associations, non-profit organizations, parents of autistic people and public in general. After the Affordable Care Act was signed into a law in 2010, there has been a renewed interest in autism with different groups wanting to include mandatory coverage for autism in the health insurance plans. The Affordable Care Act provides health care services to more Americans and access to preventive services at no additional cost which includes screening for autism for children at ages 18 and 24 months. After the Affordable Care Act, health insurance companies/plans cannot limit or deny coverage to anyone due to any pre-existing health conditions. 1

Since Dr. Andrew Wakefield’s study came out in 1998 there has been great debate about whether or not vaccinations can cause autism. The number of cases of preventable diseases has increased significantly since Dr Andrew Wakefield’s paper about the link between MMR and Autism was published. The Center for Disease Control (CDC) reported in 2015 there were 189 cases reported; and in 2014 the US experienced a record number of cases with a shocking 667 cases in one year. The numbers continue to go up as the years go by due to the fear of the vaccinations causing autism. This is a large amount of cases per year with the availability of a vaccine, these cases should be much lower or non existent at all. Vaccination not only protects healthy children, but it also protects children who are not strong enough to get the vaccine themselves. Thesis

Tens of millions of people have been diagnosed with Autism worldwide, effecting both genders, all races, ethnicities and people from all socioeconomic classes. In 2010 a Surveillance Summary was conducted in the United States, where it identified that one in 68 children are diagnosed with Autism (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2014). It has been recognised

Autism Spectrum Disorder is defined as a neurodevelopmental condition that is classified by a triad of impairments. These impairments are in communication, socialization, and repetitive patterns of behavior (Wolf, 2004). Autism affects about 1% of the current population (Shishido, Branko, & Norio, 2013). This disorder seems like a common diagnosis in the current day in age but the disorder was only discovered around sixty years ago. The two founding researchers that discovered the disorder are Kanner and Asperger. Since then there has been a significant amount of research on the disorder and they have narrowed down the criteria associated with Autism. Since the discovery of Autism Spectrum Disorder, there has been many debates on what causes this condition. When it was, a recent discovery scientist thought it could have been caused by many factors including psychological conditions and poor parenting. Now research has shifted in another direction (Wolf, 2004). In recent years, there has been a debate if childhood vaccinations or genetic mutations cause the disorder. This debate has led many parents to stop vaccinating their children in case it does cause the disorder. In 2010 (de los Reyes) the immunization rates fell to 80%. These parents’ decisions greatly effects the nation’s public health so it has fueled even more research to find the cause. A very common vaccine that has been said to cause the disorder is the measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine or the MMR vaccine. This

According to the CDC, autism is “a developmental disability that can cause significant social, communication and behavioral challenges (Facts About Autism, 2016)”. Autism was first discussed in 1943 by Dr. Leo Kanner, after he observed 11 children who had fixations on the inanimate environment rather than people (Quick Facts About Autism). It affects about one percent of the population, and is