Andrew Bolt's mocking of Greta Thunberg leaves autism advocates 'disgusted'

By bobb |

Australian News Corp columnist Andrew Bolt labels 16-year-old environmental activist ‘strange’ and ‘disturbed’

News Corp’s Andrew Bolt showed “absolute ignorance” when he mocked the teenage climate activist Greta Thunberg in a column for the Herald Sun, an autism awareness advocate says.

The high-profile columnist for Rupert Murdoch’s newspapers and Sky News commentator attacked the 16-year-old campaigner as “deeply disturbed”, “freakishly influential” and “strange” in the piece published on Wednesday.

Report highlights deep-rooted inequality in NDIS

By bobb |

This article relates to people with disability generally; it is not specific to ASD.

Shannon Jenkins

Males and people with higher incomes are more likely to benefit from the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) than other demographic groups are, according to a new report.

The article by BMC Public Health, a journal which looks at the community impact of health policy and practice, studied how social determinants of health at the individual level can contribute to deep-seated health inequalities when combined with complex policy-delivery systems.

It found the ability to exercise choice is distributed unequally through personalisation schemes like the NDIS.

Unusual eating behaviors may be a new diagnostic indicator for autism

By bobb |

Atypical eating behaviors may be a sign a child should be screened for autism, according to a new study from Penn State College of Medicine.

Research by Susan Mayes, professor of psychiatry, found that atypical eating behaviors were present in 70% of children with autism, which is 15 times more common than in neurotypical children.

Atypical eating behaviors may include severely limited food preferences, hypersensitivity to food textures or temperatures, and pocketing food without swallowing.

The 'problematic' rise in students excluded from mainstream classes

By bobb |

Henrietta Cook

An increasing number of students with autism are being excluded from mainstream classes according to new research which raises concerns about the segregation of children with disabilities.

The Monash University research found that between 2009 and 2015, the inclusion of autistic students in mainstream classes dropped from 18.8 per cent to just 3.3 per cent.

During this period, the proportion of students with autism in special schools increased from 37 to 52 per cent.

Leave No Autistic Mother Behind: Autism and Motherhood – Experiences, Challenges and Positive Strategies (COSP12 Side Event)

By bobb |

A4 and AFDO represented in UN Side Event

13 Jun 2019 -  Autism is a partially genetic, lifelong neurodevelopmental difference, yet there is limited research examining parenting in autistic mothers.

This side-event will discuss, from both an academic and an experiential point of view – including through 2 panellists who would be speaking both as researchers and as autistic mothers – the experiences of autistic mothers in areas related to parenthood: pregnancy, childbirth and the postpartum period, self-perception of parenting strengths and weaknesses, communication with professionals in relation to one's child, and the social experience of motherhood, including disclosing one’s diagnosis of autism in parenting contexts.