What is Causing the Autism Crisis?

What is Autism?

As specified in the current Fifth Edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5), individuals diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) all share features of impaired social communication and social interaction, combined with restricted, repetitive patterns of behaviour, interests, or activities. Appearing no later than eight years of age, presenting across a spectrum from mild to severe, autism symptoms limit and impair everyday functioning with lifelong ramifications.

Epidemiology of Autism

There has been limited research into the prevalence of ASD in NZ so estimates are based on international data with up to 3% of the population thought to be affected. The incidence of autism amongst NZ children continues to rise and the cause has reportedly been baffling scientists since at least 2011.

On 17 April 2025 the latest Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring Network (ADDM) Report was published by the US Centers for Disease Control. On the same day, US Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS), Robert F Kennedy Jr addressed a press conference outlining key data from the report. His first comment was that the data  is already two years old. The new administration plans to update processes so that real-time data on chronic disease is available to the American public in order that timely responses can be implemented. ​​​​​​

Kennedy’s scrutiny of the data emphasises the “unrelenting upward trend” of autism prevalence. The baseline for childhood autism in the USA was set in 1970 after the world’s largest epidemiological study followed all 900,000 children under the age of 12 in the state of Wisconsin. Sixty children were identified with autism in this study: a prevalence rate of 0.7 per 10,000 children.

That Mr Kennedy has promised studies which will reveal the cause of autism by this September – far too soon to convene and complete new research – must mean one thing: HHS possesses the evidence already. His much-opposed appointment has added the political favour always lacking up to now. 

The most recent ADDM Report provides an autism prevalence rate of 1 in every 31 children, which is up from 1 in every 36 children in 2020. The prevalence rate in the year 2000 was 1 in every 150 children. Boys have a much higher risk at 1 in 20, and in California the rate for boys is 1 in every 12.5 which may be a more accurate reflection of the national prevalence rate given that California has the most reliable data collection.

What Causes Autism?

Changes to diagnostic criteria and detection of milder cases do not explain the upward trend, which was described well by a MIND Institute study published in 2009. Whilst genes may provide a vulnerability for certain conditions, they do not cause epidemics and an environmental exposure is the clear cause for the rising rates of autism. Kennedy repeatedly refers to the “canard of epidemic denial” in which Wisconsin’s 1970 study researchers, teachers, parents, doctors and other professionals would have had to miss 98.8% of the autistic children in their presence, for the increased prevalence to be due to variations in detection methods or criteria.

Current Hypotheses on Autism

Dr James Lyons-Weiler PhD is an evolutionary biologist with expertise in complex systems biology, cancer biomarkers research and bioinformatics who founded the Institute of Pure and Applied Knowledge (IPAK), an associated online learning site IPAK-EDU, and the Journal of Science, Public Health Policy and the Law. He gave a presentation to Doctors 4 Covid Ethics recently titled We Know the Causes of Autism, describing complex interactions between associated determinants including genetic and environmental factors.

Outspoken cardiologist / epidemiologist, Dr Peter McCullough presented at the Autism Summit in San Diego in April on Determinants of Autism. The Independent Medical Alliance hosted a webinar presentation and discussion between Dr Paul Marik and Dr Andrew Wakefield, The Forbidden Conversation: Autism, Vaccines, and the Search for Truth.

A number of themes are common to all of these dialogues. Risk factors for autism appear to be a complex interplay between a dysregulated immune system, genetic vulnerabilities and toxic exposures. Certain circumstances add to these risks, including prematurity before 37 weeks of gestation and children born to older parents.

In his 2019 PhD thesis The Political Economy of Autism, Dr Toby Rogers outlined the “extraordinary impacts of ASD on individuals, families, and communities” and explained the myriad reasons as to why public health authorities have not yet restricted the toxins known to increase autism risk. The financial cost to families runs into millions across an affected child’s lifetime, and the cost to American taxpayers alone is at around $1 trillion per year. Dr Rogers spoke with Del Bigtree on The Highwire on 16 January 2020, on the True Cost of Autism (from around 52 minutes).

A division of HHS, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) is the medical research agency of the USA with a budget of US$48 billion. The new Director of the NIH, Professor Jay Bhattacharya spoke about his administration’s plans for an independent research program to investigate the causes of autism with Dr Drew last month. This is a pivot from the established culture at NIH under Francis Collins, where research that potentially threatens corporate interests was systematically suppressed.

Suppression of Autism Research

The suppression of a possible association between vaccine ingredients and autism was discussed in a 2008 interview between cardiologist Bernadine Healy (NIH Director from 1991 to 1993) and journalist Sharyl Attkisson. Dr Healy took issue with an official government report disregarding the need to investigate the hypothesis of vaccine ingredients having any causal association with autism.

Attorney with the Informed Consent Action Network, Aaron Siri, has deposed leading vaccinologists to give evidence in court a number of times. In January 2018 Dr Stanley Plotkin admitted under oath that studies have not been conducted to investigate causal associations between vaccines and autism (at 35 minutes). In August 2020 Dr Kathryn Edwards also testified that vaccine clinical trials have not been designed to exclude a causal link between vaccines and autism.

Medical fraud and corporate domination of research, including use of the Disinformation Playbook against researchers asking the ‘wrong’ questions or making the ‘wrong’ conclusions, has ensured a public consensus based purely on propaganda, that vaccines have nothing to do with autism. Retraction of published peer reviewed papers is a common ploy used to discredit evidence that endangers corporate interests.

The most notable example of this is Dr Andrew Wakefield’s study RETRACTED: Ileal-lymphoid-nodular hyperplasia, non-specific colitis, and pervasive developmental disorder in children, a case series about 12 children with chronic “gastrointestinal disease and developmental regression … generally associated in time with possible environmental triggers“, which ended his medical career and destroyed his reputation.  Despite claims to the contrary, his conclusion specifically noted that: “We did not prove an association between measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine and the syndrome described.“​​

Scientists claiming that the science is settled tend to have financial or other conflicts of interest. Perhaps the most influential examples are Dr Paul Offit, who earned up to US$45 million in 2008 from vaccine royalties; and Dr Peter Hotez who subcontracted to the Wuhan Institute of Virology and has been very vocal, in partnership with the World Health Organization, about the need for aggressive silencing of “anti vaxxers”.

Eight studies cited frequently as “proof” that there is no association between vaccines and autism were authored by two CDC affiliated researchers. Both have been exposed as having committed fraud. Paul Thorsen was indicted for stealing grant money. William Thompson became a whistleblower, admitting to the falsification of data to conceal evidence of a causal link between MMR vaccine and autism.

Meanwhile, the number of direct comparison studies showing consistently that vaccinated children suffer from more of – well, everything – than their unvaccinated peers has increased considerably in the last few years. There are many parents, scientists and informed bloggers who are unequivocal that biomolecular causes of autism may be various but they can all be found in the vaccination schedule, and they do go to much effort presenting their evidence. 

It is sometimes said that anecdotes aren’t data. But enough of them can add up, and one data point that has been obvious to us is the number of formerly card-carrying members of the medical orthodoxy who, through being yanked awake by medicine’s systemic failures which enabled the covid jab madness, have looked at other vaccines to which they previously gave their unthinking support. Brave truth seekers such as Drs Peter McCullough, Pierre Kory and James Thorp have stared into the vaccine safety research abyss and sworn “never again”. 

A Hopeful Future

Children are our most precious assets, and they deserve to be protected against the clear and precipitous rise in neurodevelopmental harms occurring amidst entangled crimes and conflicts of interest of those who stand to benefit. The future of humanity depends upon moves being made by the new US administration, towards impartial funding decisions and methods of research design, with child health as the central focus. This turning point is a triumphant win for medical ethics and legitimate science which has occurred against incredible odds. We look forward to a positive impact for children everywhere, including in New Zealand.