[Menehune56]

Oldtimers disease has been around as long as old people have and now that life expectancy is increasing more people live long enough to exhibit symptoms.

However, this article seems to say that autism of some kind affects 12% of kids? That does sound awfully high!

[faithhopecharity]

Thanks for all the quick replies.
I agree partly.
It does seem like maybe the Authorities have come up with new names and applied them to a lot of folks who were always with us.
But, it still seems that there are many more cases of both conditions nowadays.
I could be wrong. But the autism thing seems to be far in excess of the number of “slow” kids back in my Paleolithic Age grammar school days. And, my Lord they’ve got zillions of people locked up or housed in special places (not to even mention all those at home) for “Alzheimers” -—

It just SEEMS that the number of cases of these conditions far exceed when I was young.

[Harmless Teddy Bear]

However, this article seems to say that autism of some kind affects 12% of kids? That does sound awfully high!

It is.

They have expanded it from kids who rock back and fourth and scream if they are touched, to kids who have trouble reading non-verbal signals (we used to call these kids literal) to kids who are standoffish and uncommunicative or what used to be called shy.

It is sort of like calling everyone who's hair is not jet black "blond". You can raise the statistical number of blonds though the roof.

[Graybeard58]

However, this article seems to say that autism of some kind affects 12% of kids? That does sound awfully high!

Yes, that would be high but it doesn't say "12%", it says:

An estimated one of every 88 children in the United States has an autism spectrum disorder

That's a little over 01%.

[Triple]

more like 1/88, which = 1.1%

Still a lot of kids, but you are off by an order of magnitude.