Autism

Autism, also known as autism spectrum disorder, is a condition characterized by differences or difficulties in social communication and interaction, a need or strong preference for predictability and routine, sensory processing differences, focused interests, and repetitive behaviors. Characteristics of autism are present from early childhood and the condition typically persists ... Wikipedia

 USA Facts

In 2022, 32 out of 1,000 monitored 8-year-olds were diagnosed with autism. In other words, that’s 3.2%, which was up from 1.5% in 2010 and 0.7% in 2000. Boys are more than three times more likely to be diagnosed with autism than girls. In 2022, 4.9% of 8-year-old boys had autism, compared to 1.4% of 8-year-old girls. As diagnostic tools improve and doctors track developmental differences more closely, doctors are diagnosing more and more children nationwide. The CDC says it’s unclear how much the increase can be attributed to changes to the clinical definition of autism, or increased efforts to diagnose. Autism is being diagnosed earlier, too. Children born in 2018 were 1.7 times more likely to be diagnosed by age 4 than those born in 2014. The CDC collected this data in 2022, the most recent report year, by tracking 274,857 children at 16 sites in 14 states and Puerto Rico. The prevalence of autism varied by site. The CDC defines “prevalence” as the number of people in a set population that have a condition. Combined prevalence includes data across all sites.