We're Back!! 2021 ASD Prevalence

Welcome back to season 2 of “what the AUTISM?!” This podcast is intended for listeners who are interested in learning and better understanding the autism diagnosis. If you are a new listener to our podcast, welcome to our community! Whether you are a parent, a health care provider, a teacher, a fellow community member, or an aspiring behavior analyst, this podcast is meant to create an ongoing discussion with you the listeners, to better understand all the mysteries to this autism diagnosis and be a resource to one another as we each partake in this journey together.

Since posting my very first episode, we’ve grown such a big community here, so I would like to start off this season with a quick recap of who I am, what is autism, and what our next steps are. My name is Amanda. I’m a Board Certified Behavior Analyst (BCBA) and I had been working with clients with Autism for about 8 years.

Straight out of my undergrad, I started off as a behavior therapist at a large ABA agency. Fast forward a few years, I got a masters degree in ABA and my BCBA license in 2016 and practiced as a clinician and a clinical manager leading a team of about 50 staff members and over 40 families and patients. I’m currently a graduate student at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health researching and learning more about this autism diagnosis.

Let me clarify that although, I am a BCBA and an aspiring researcher, the intent of this podcast is to share my experiences and my knowledge to help my listeners better understand the Autism diagnosis and where the current research stands, but please note that this is not a means of medical or psychological diagnoses nor recommendations.

To open up our first episode, let’s talk about the updated prevalence data that was published recently in December 2021. The prevalence of Autism Spectrum Disorder in the US is 1 in 44.

But where do these numbers and data exactly come from? If you’ve been following the reporting of new prevalence data, there’s an updated prevalence report for ASD every 2 years. This data is published by CDC’s ADDM Network, which stands for Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring Network. The ADDM Network conducts active surveillance of ASD. When the ADDM Network publishes new prevalence data, this is based on the data that is collected from previous years. The 1 in 44 prevalence data is based on the 2018 data, so we wouldn’t know about the current 2021/2022 data till a later date, but one thing we know for sure is that the prevalence of ASD is ongoingly increasing. We started with 1 in 150 back in the 2000 surveillance year. The ongoing question is, why is the prevalence of autism increasing so rapidly? Is it the environment? Is it the food? Is it the changes to the diagnostic criteria? Great question…we don’t know! There are still so many unknowns when it comes to autism but over the years researchers have uncovered so many variables and risk factors when it comes to autism. This season, we’ll be specifically diving into some key findings over the course of the last decade. Let’s break down what each of these findings implies for the future of autism research, treatment, and policy changes.

If there are any other topics/questions, you’d like for us to cover, please reach out to us via email or on Instagram. You can always connect with me via email at whattheautismpodcast@gmail.com or on our Facebook page/Instagram @whattheautism. We upload a new episode on your favorite podcast platform every Sunday. Please note that this podcast has been created to discuss my personal experiences and opinions and is not a means of medical or psychological recommendations. But if you enjoyed this podcast, please make sure to follow and subscribe to our podcast channel, and I’ll see you in our next episode.