It is fairly regular these days that I will read a story in a newspaper or see an item on television that features autism. I generally find once I get to the end of the article or TV item, that I am no wiser from when I started. Unless you have a genuine interest in autism then I don't think there is any need to report about it. Documentaries show autistic children and adults to be different, or to use their favourite word 'special' they never show autistic children or adults just going about their business. How about we see them doing all the positive things, working with helpers , carers, and educators. What main stream has not yet cottoned on to is that autism is on the rise and it is here to stay. Autistic behaviour is not something,  to be wiped out like polio, or given an immunisation like measles. It is part of our evolution.(not wishing to sound like a mad scientist).

An average primary school of about 300 pupils may have one or two autistic children attending now in 2013 but I would make a serious bet that in years to come that number will only increase. Granted the process of diagnosing has radically improved and children are being placed on the spectrum who a few years ago would be just thought of as a little slow,  but that still does not detract from the fact that the number of children being born with autism is on the increase. Here in the U.K the estimate is one in every 100 and now in the U.S.A.  recent estimates have suggested that it is as many as one in every 88 children born.

Since no one really knows what causes autism, I have taken it upon my self to ask any body who has contact with autistic people on a regular basis, what they think causes it. I have asked Doctors, teachers, (primary and secondary), pediatricians, psychologists, and other parents like myself. Some say "no one knows" others say "there is an anomaly in the brain" which is fine but what causes that. The best answer and one that makes most sense is "there is too much stimuli out there, it is all around us all the time, for approximately nine months baby goes were mum goes hears what mum hears watches what mum watches" Not for nothing do they tell us playing Mozart to our unborn children improves their intelligence.So unless we can learn to live in near silence again,  with the only media shouting at us is the paper seller on the corner, I think we are going to have to get used to welcoming more and more autistic children into the world.

Off course I am but a humble parent of an autistic boy now 11 years old, I have spent those years looking after him and not at University studying Autism. So anything I have to say is purely gleaned from experience.It is a layman's perspective if you will.