When you see an austic child there is no mistaking he/she is one. Interesting that the Amish, who do not vaccinate, don't have Autism in their ranks, but the surrounding areas in Illinois, for example, where kids are heavily vaccinated, have 38 in 10,000.
Since there are definitely genetic links in autism, as it defintely does run in families.
I have a special needs kid (brain damage from an illness), so I am on lots of online boards with parents of autistic kids. Some of them had one autistic kid who was vacinated, so they didn't vacinate their next child. Well, the 2nd child still got autism.
I'm not saying that vacinations don't contribute, but we don't know yet what does.
My thoughts about the Amish is that they are all closely linked genetically (related), so that is probably why they don't get autism as high as other people.
Also, autism tends to run in highly educated families.
Amish also don't have television, electricity, automobiles,.... They have a very active lifestyle and have a lower diabetes rate than the general population, too. There are way too many factors in their lifestyles that could influence the autism rate to be able to say for certain that it's vaccinations.