Which tended to hold down the number of cases, nobody wants to be blamed for such a catastrophic problem. Now, the schools get money and parents can get SSI for children with the diagnosis. Which tends to increase the number of diagnoses. Good summary. I think there is both an increase (over the last 30 years) in the diagnosis of genuine autism cases that might not made it into the statistics in the past. However, there's also an increase in autism diagnoses for "any kid who's a bit different."
I'm worried about sending Pat to Sunday School next year, because he talks to space ships on his pocket calculator and thinks he's invisible!
Bless your heart! I'm sure I worried my parents when I was an itty bitty . . . I didn't think I was invisible, but I had several "invisible friends" (one was Sherlock Holmes!) and I held voluble conversations with them in embarrassing places like the grocery store (or Sunday School). And let's not even start with the odd habits like sleeping on my closet shelf (or UNDER my bed), insisting on wearing my clothes inside out (it was to keep away fairies, the malevolent kind, but I don't think I explained that adequately to my mother . . . ), etc.
Fortunately we live in the South, we cherish our eccentrics, not as much as the English do, but more than other parts of the country.