Autism is on the rise. Today the risk of having a child with autism stands at about 1:110. No one is sure if it is on the rise because of better diagnosis procedures or because of more children being diagnosed. Whatever the reason, it stands that you are more likely to have a child with autism, or know a child of autism than ever before.
While scientists haven't been able to pin down one precise cause of autism, there are several things which occur prenatally which may cause autism. It has also been found that there is a strong genetic element to autism. Studies have found that the chances for a child to have autism increases if there is a sibling or other close blood relative with autism.
None of the prenatal causes for autism have been proven 100% to be a cause of autism, but there is significant information to show that they are linked to autism.
One of those things is parental age. The age of the parents when the child is born has a direct impact on the risk of the child of having autism. It isn't sure yet if it is both parents, or just the mother or father. The reasons for this aren't clear. It could be because or increased complications as a parent gets older, as well as risks of mutations. Unlike other issues where maternal age matters more, in this case paternal age factors in more.
One potential prenatal causes of autism include some viral infections that the mother might have while pregnant. This is because the illness can cause the mother's immune system to go into overdrive. As her immune system goes crazy it can attack the foreign cells baby's body. Congenital rubella syndrome is the most common infection. Rubella, or German measles, is also linked to other things like schizophrenia, as well as blindness and deafness in babies.
There are other environmental things that could cause autism and birth defects. Those things are called teratogens. Some of them a woman has control of, others are beyond control. There are several studies exploring alcohol as one of the causes of autism, as well finding out if it's related to birth defects like fetal alcohol syndrome.
Women who are surrounded by specific chemicals that are found in pesticides have been found to have a higher incidence of autism in their families. In families where there is already a genetic element the chances that a child with end up with autism because of exposure to pesticides and fertilizers increase dramatically.
There are a lot of theories behind what causes autism. These theories are the ones that have the most agreement in the scientific community. There are some others that have been put out there, but not a lot of people are doing studies or believe that they are a significant cause. One of those is fetal exposure to ultrasound. There have been studies that have linked neuron disruption in mice with prolonged exposure to ultrasound. However, there hasn't been any significant human studies done on this subject.
There is no one agreed on cause of autism, but there are many things that can happen prior to birth that can push a child with a predisposition to it into having autism.
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