The cause of the increase is probably due to the invention of the “autism spectrum,” which means all sorts of things that didn’t used to be diagnosed as autism now are. A diagnosis of autism also turns on the money machine.
exactly. I might want to add that in the past, people with autism might have been diagnosed as either just retarded in the case of low functioning autistics or mentally ill in the case of the higher functioning ones.
People who have kids diagnosed with autism get better support and services than people with just mentally retarded children. This leads some people to really push for that autism diagnosis