INTRODUCTION

What is Autism?
Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) refers to a group of complex neurodevelopment
disorders characterized by repetitive and characteristic patterns of behavior and
difficulties with social communication and interaction. The symptoms are present from
early childhood and affect daily functioning.
What is the spectrum and what does that mean?
The term spectrum refers to the wide range of symptoms, skills, and levels of disability
in functioning that can occur in people with ASD. Some children and adults with ASD
are fully able to perform all activities of daily living while others require substantial
support to perform basic activities, such as tying their shoe or asking a question.
Until recently, the types of ASD have been determined by guidelines in the diagnostic
manual (DSM - IV) of the American Psychiatric Association. According to the CDC, the
three main types of ASD are: Asperger's syndrome, Pervasive developmental disorder,
not otherwise specified (PDD-NOS), and Autistic disorder. The DSM -IV also included
two rare but severe autistic-like conditions -- Rett syndrome and childhood disintegrative
disorder.
What does ASD do to a person?
Many people with ASD find social interactions difficult. The nature of typical
communication and interaction is often particularly challenging. Children with ASD may
fail to respond to their names, avoid eye contact with other people, and only interact

with others to achieve specific goals, speaking minimally to accomplish that. Often
children with ASD do not understand how to play or engage with other children and may
prefer to be alone, or rather play next to a child rather than with them. People with ASD
may find it difficult to understand other peoples feelings or talk about their own feelings.
People with ASD may have very different verbal abilities ranging from no speech at all
to speech that is fluent, but awkward and inappropriate. Some children with ASD may
have delayed speech and language skills, may repeat phrases, and may give unrelated
answers to questions, such as answering every question with yes or no. In addition,
people with ASD can have a hard time using and understanding non-verbal cues such
as gestures, body language, or tone of voice. People with ASD may also speak in flat,
robot-like or a sing-song voice about a narrow range of favorite topics, with little regard
for the interests of the person to whom they are speaking as they dont think about
anything but their topic at that moment in time. Many children with ASD engage in
repetitive movements or unusual behaviors such as flapping their arms, rocking from
side to side, or twirling. They may become preoccupied with parts of objects like the
wheels on a toy truck. Children may also become obsessively interested in a particular
topic such as dinosaurs or memorizing the dates movies come out. Many people with
ASD seem to thrive so much on routine that changes to the daily patterns of life, like an
unexpected stop on the way home from school, can be very stressful. Some children
may even get upset and have emotional outbursts, especially when placed in a new or
overly stimulating environment.
WHERE DOES IT COME FROM

Government Funding: What the Government Wants Us to See

Recently President Obama signed legislation renewing the landmark Combating Autism
Act, which assures continued federal support for critical autism research, services and
treatment for the next three years. The Combating Autism Reauthorization Act (CARA),
originally sponsored by Chris Smith and Mike Doyle in the House of Representatives
and Robert Menendez and Mike Enzi in the Senate, would not have passed without the
tireless efforts of advocates throughout the autism community. CARA passed
unanimously in both the House and Senate despite an uncertain fiscal environment.
The new law continues the federal governments commitment to autism research,
services and treatment at current levels, authorizing $693 million over the next three
years. The original act provided nearly $945 million over five years. Since its passage in
2006, significant advances have been made in determining potential causes for autism
as well as promising new early intervention behavioral treatments. By signing CARA into
law, President Obama has ensured the federal governments commitment to autism so
that crucial research can continue unimpeded for the next three years.
Government Organizations that have helped with funding dealing with autism:

HHS- Human and Health Services

o NIH- National Institute of Health

OARC- Office of Autism Research Coordination

IACC- Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee

CDC- Center for Disease Control

DOD- Department of Defense

ACL- Administration for Community Living

DOE- Department of Education

HRSA- Health Resources and Services Administration

What I See
Many different Government agencies put forth money to help out in autism funding.
This fact alone is very important to me. However autism is still a very low priority in the
life of the government. It often gets pushed aside for more urgent matters in the eyes
of the public and so while money does get funneled in, its not nearly the same amount
as money for the funding of Leukemia, Muscle Dystrophy, AIDS, and Juvenile Diabetes.
It is close to half of what the seconded lowest amount is, however it autism affects a
larger percentage of our population. 1 in 68 kids are diagnosed with autism, while 1 in
100,000 have muscle dystrophy and that receives over double the amount of funding.
WHERE DOES IT GO
Research
According to the last few years Autism Speaks, one of the largest organizations
supporting autism in the US, spends 35-45% of funding on research. According to the

last few years the National Institute of Health only gives funding to projects that involve
research. Research when it comes to autism is crazy high as no one is 100% certain
what causes autism and where it comes from. Scientists have managed to figure out
that it is at least partially due to genetics but results past that are indecisive. This
causes more and more money to be spent on research in hopes of being able to
prevent autism from occurring once scientists figure out what causes it. Unfortunately
this is only a small portion of what is actually needed to help people with autism and
their families and the government and scientists seem to forget.
Families are looking for interventions, not papers.
- Thomas Insel, National Institute of Mental Health, on the need to translate genetic
research findings into practical treatments for autism.
Autism has been littered with decades of false promise and small piolet trials that turn
out to be nothing, and even silly, silly medicines that lead to a lot of hope but go
nowhere.
-Alexander Kolevzon, Seaver Autism Center in New York City, on proceeding
with cautious optimism following promising results from a trial of IGF-1 to treat PhelanMcDermid syndrome.
Advertising & Services
The other parts funding goes to included advertising/awareness and services. Making
people aware of autism is very important as it can help others who may not have heard

about autism before and their child or family member could very well be affected without
realizing. Advertising also helps to pull in additional funding from sources other than the
government. While all this is great the most important part of funding is the services for
the people with autism and their families. The people need the services to help them
live as normal a life as possible given whatever variation of ASD they have. However
according to Autism Speaks that was their lowest percentage of the funding spent. At a
measly three percent there are not as many great and helpful services as there could
be. For an organization designed to help people with autism they should invest in more
funding spent on services to help instead of advertising and research.

Work Cited
Autism Spectrum Disorder. WebMD. WebMD, n.d. Web. 10 November 2015.
Crosse, Marcia. Federal Autism Activities. Autism Speaks. United States Government
Accountability Office, 20 May 2014. Web. 4 November 2015.
Funding: Project Listing by Category. Research Portfolio Online Reporting Tools. National
Institute of Health, 8 July 2015. Web. 7 November 2015.
Leonard, Andrew. President Obama Signs Landmark Combating Autism Act. Autism Speaks.
Autism Speaks, 12 September 2014. Web. 2 November 2015.
National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke. Autism Spectrum Disorder Fact Sheet.
NINDS. National Institute of Health, 3 November 2015. Web. 10 November 2015.