Seeing as April is Autism Awareness Month, more media attention is being paid to the autism spectrum of disorders than at any other time.  As a result, many of these articles are about the rise of autism.  Is it an epidemic or simply a rise in diagnoses?  Today, Autism News Direct will provide you links to several different stories that address this question from a variety of viewpoints.
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St. Anthony’s School in Northvale, New Jersey which has an unusually high percentage of teachers giving birth to autistic children, will not receive the $50,000 in funding needed to look at this increased rate of autism.  From an article posted on NorthJersey.com

St. Anthony’s has housed a Northern Valley District program for children diagnosed with autism and other disorders for the last 30 years. The Walnut Street building is owned by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Newark.

According to a WCBStv.com report, the first study done to look at the rates of autism and other developmental concerns that children of St. Anthony’s staff face concluded that of the

24 current or former school employees who had children either while they worked at the school or since then. Their 42 offspring included 24 with developmental disorders — 10 with autism.

The school’s air quality has been tested and the classes have been moved from the main building but nothing conclusive has been determined.  This increased rate of autism spectrum disorders has given some boost to the environmental factors hypothesis that researchers are looking at when helping to determine the causes of autism.

Sources:

NorthJersey.com

WCBStv.com

The University of California at Davis’ M.I.N.D. Institute has just published the results of a study looking into the maternal immune system as it relates to autism, most notably the regressive type of autism.  In a news release, the M.I.N.D. Institute announced that the complete findings will be published in the March 2008 issue of Neurotoxicology.

“Antibodies in the blood of mothers of children with autism bind to fetal brain cells, potentially interrupting healthy brain development. The study authors also found that the reaction was most common in mothers of children with the regressive form of autism…”

This unique study gives scientists and parents hope that a definitive cause may be determined for this type of autism.  Regressive autism occurs after a period of normal development - children will lose speech and language skills, toileting abilities, etc; some parents and advocacy groups consider regressive autism the most catastrophic to families.

Source:  UC Davis News Release