Note: The laws in California and New York now require expelling healthy, whole students based on their vaccination status. At the same time, schools are turning into pysch wards and play grounds are more like prison grounds with violence and trouble. Are we so worried about measles or chicken pox of pertussis that we think it is acceptable, even necessary to remove students who may be honor roll 4.0 kids, athletes, leaders, kind kids, special needs kids, every type of kid?

I'm reminded of an old 1960s commercial for Armour hot dogs, "Hot dogs! Armour hot dogs! What kind of kids eat Armour hot dogs? Fat kids. Skinny kids. Kids who climb on rocks. Tough kids. Sissy Kids. Even kids with chicken pox love hot dogs! Armour hot dogs! The Dogs! Kids! Love! To Bite!"

Today, kids without a chicken pox shot are to be feared and removed, like criminals.  Meanwhile, the violent behavior of our critically and chronically unwell population of students escalates to never before seen heights.

Hot diggety dog...

By Anne Dachel

TWO RECENT STORIES on Age of Autism were about the explosion in school violence seemingly everywhere.

June 11, 2019, Violence, Aggression Taking Over Classrooms in Ore-GONE

And June 7, 2019, Iowa Teachers Reach Breaking Point Over Student Violence 

So what is happening to children from Iowa to Oregon and from Maine to California? Curiously this is never a topic for the national networks or major print media.

On my website LossOfBrainTrust.com I manage to post a few of the non-stop local stories from around the world each day. (Believe me I could add hundreds if I really worked at it.)

So what is the public supposed to think when they read about VIOLENCE in schools (more and more it’s elementary schools) in their town?

Why are schools across the country adding “calming rooms” to help with aggressive students?

Why are state legislatures passing laws on restraining and secluding kids as young as kindergarteners?

Why are more districts partnering with mental health providers and adding in-school therapy?

When will the local stories add up to being a national issue? Will the candidates care about this issue in 2020?

Here are some examples of just how bad things are EVERYWHERE:Oslo, Norway: Armed police and emergency health care personnel responded swiftly to calls of a “threatening situation” involving a knife at a primary school in Oslo this week. Eight minutes later they had control of the suspect, a little boy who apparently was angry with his teacher. … It was just the latest example of violence at Norwegian schools, also now those with the youngest pupils. …

A new report confirms the incident was not unusual. Norway’s workplace regulatory agency Arbeidstilsynet has just recently surveyed 93 primary and junior high schools in southeastern Norway, and state broadcaster NRK reported on Wednesday that the findings were raising alarm: fully 90 percent of the schools lack routines to prevent violence and threats. School employees don’t receive training in how threatening situations can be warded off.

…“The problems are the biggest in the primary schools,” federation leader Steffen Handal told NRK. “Teachers are subject to a rising degree of violence from pupils. We’ve seen incidents double from 2005 to 2018.”

Brighton, MI: Officials with Brighton Area Schools have provided some clarification about student disruptions at Hawkins Elementary School in Brighton. On Wednesday, WHMI reported that special education students were causing daily disruptions at the school to the point where a class may have to be evacuated 2-3 times a day because of a disruptive or violent student.

Anne Dachel transcribed Rep Adam Schiff's speech from June 13, 2019, on the dangers of “vaccine hesitancy” and what to do about it. See FB post here.

“I rise today to offer an amendment in support of vaccines and the medical effectiveness. Specifically my amendment would direct $5 million to amplify a public health campaign to promote vaccine usage and combat hesitancy.

These funds would support the work of the national vaccine program within the office of infectious disease policy and HIV aids, which provides a framework for pursuing the prevention of infectious diseases through immunizations. It is the nation’s leading roadmap in articulating a comprehensive strategy to develop new and approved vaccines, enhance the vaccine safety system, and support communications to enhance vaccine decision making.

Each year vaccines are estimated to save two to three million lives worldwide. Due to effective vaccination campaigns, what were once referred to as the usual diseases of childhood, are now considered vaccine preventable diseases.

Unfortunately, vaccines are a victim of their own success. These monumental public health achievements have contributed to a false perception that disease threats are minimal and that routine vaccination is no longer necessary.  

This year alone we have witnessed numerous outbreaks of measles across the country—a disease that was once considered eradicated in the United States.

Declining vaccination rates pose an imminent threat to public health. In fact the World Health Organization has identified vaccine hesitancy as a top global health threat for 2019.

There is strong evidence to suggest that at least part of the source of this trend is the degree to which medically inaccurate information about vaccines surfaces on websites where many Americans get their information.

Repetition of information, even if false, can often be mistaken for accuracy. And exposure to anti-vaccine content via social media may negatively sharp user attitudes towards vaccination.

The emergence of vaccine hesitancy as an increasingly common theme in health care settings demands attention. And it is imperative for public health officials to take a necessary and critical step to flip the script from vaccine hesitancy to vaccine confidence to protect and bolster the public health.

The scientific and medical communities are in overwhelming consensus that vaccines are both effective and safe.

There is no evidence to suggest that vaccines cause life-threatening or disabling diseases and the dissemination of unfounded or debunked theories about the dangers of vaccination pose a great risk to the public health.

Support for the national vaccine program in coordinating a national public health campaign to fight vaccine misinformation is imperative.

It is essential now more than ever that we fund vaccine communication research to strengthen the evidence-based for what works in fighting vaccine hesitance, combating misinformation and encouraging responsible vaccine decision-making.    

By Anne Dachel

On May 21, 2019, Business Insider published a piece entitled, The anti-vaxx movement is fueling the measles epidemic by deliberately targeting communities most affected by the disease.

Hundreds of people, mostly ultra-Orthodox Jews, gathered at a rally in Rockland County, New York last week to listen as speakers ticked off a slew of unverified claims about vaccinations.

The story included prominent critics of the mandated vaccine program: Robert Kennedy, Jr. Del Bigtree, Barbara Loe Fisher, and Dr. Andrew Wakefield via Skype. Also in the gathering was an outspoken leader in the Orthodox Jewish community from Brooklyn, Rabbi William Handler. Brooklyn is an area where the measles outbreak is especially acute.

Readers were told that most of the attendees were “ultra Orthodox Jews,” and that these are “people who are mostly isolated from the outside world and have limited access to the internet or scientific research, can be particularly vulnerable to anti-vaxx rhetoric.”

At a May 14^th  rally in Albany Handler joined other activists in attacking a bill that would remove the right to a religious exemption from vaccines. “We have come here today to protest this latest desecration of God in culture to take away the religious exemption.” 

Handler has received coverage by such well-known vaccine defenders as the Washington Post and the New York Times.  A hit piece by Kimiko de Freytas-Tamura at the Times with the headline, Despite Measles Warnings, Anti-Vaccine Rally Draws Hundreds of Ultra-Orthodox Jews,  sounded more like an editorial than standard journalism.  Anyone questioning vaccine safety and calling for the right to exempt children were blamed for “the spread of misinformation.”

Handler was featured saying that his community has recently been demonized.  "We Hasidim have been chosen as the target... the campaign against us has been successful,” but the Times accused him of having  “falsely described the measles outbreak among Jews as part of an elaborate plan concocted by Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York to deflect attention from ‘more serious’ diseases brought by Central American migrants.”

There was of course no mention of any risk involved with mass vaccination with multiple vaccines at once, or the fact that the people making and giving the vaccines can’t be sued for injuries resulting from the shots.

(To understand the attitude at the NY Times, one need only to look at the 2011 story where in attacking the movie, The Greater Good, reporter Jeannette Catsoulis made this stunning statement:

“But while the film acknowledges that science has so far been consistent in its refutation of a vaccine-autism link, it fails to point out that even were such a link proved definitively, all that matters is that its victims number significantly fewer than those of the diseases vaccinations are designed to prevent.”)

While the real fear mongers warn about measles outbreaks, Rabbi Handler continues to call attention to individual civil rights along with questions about the safety and efficacy of the measles vaccine.

In this 4 minute video from June 4^th, Rabbi Handler explained his views.

Note: Our Anne Dachel has been cataloguing the demise of the pediatric brain for over a decade at Age of Autism. Our children are sicker than ever and increasingly incapable of functioning in a traditional American classroom. Behavior plans replaced weekend plans with friends.  Detention is a quaint remnant of another era, as arrests and calls to "211" have become the norm. Teachers find themselves needing to learn how to block, place a student into a submission, and restrain as if the classroom as become the Octagon.

Here in Connecticut, we have "PMT" training for educators.  It's supposed to support safe interactions during a behavior. But when there is violent aggression, staff are woefully unprepared. The result is more injury to staff in school. And that's never acceptable. At the same time, as a parent of three daughters with special needs, I know that restraints and submissions can maim, wound and even kill - think sleeper hold. It happens.  I teach martial arts. My Sensei and I have a class called ASD - Autism Self Defense, for families. The problem in schools is that teachers and staff can not use techniques that really work - that send a message. Stop. And let's face it, as parents we do not want them to touch our kids - not on a bet.  The answer isn't martial arts training for staff - that's ridiculous and would take years for any training to take affect.

But training is an issue - and discussed heavily in the article for Oregon which is part of a series. However, the real problem is this: 

“Have mental health people, have counselors so we don’t have to pull staff from other assignments,” said Winters. “Because that’s what happening right now. Principals are being pulled, other assistants.” 

Why the increase in disruptive behavior?  

There are several theories on why disruptive incidents are on the rise in Oregon classrooms but no in-depth research on what’s causing it.

Teachers say more trauma at home and less support in schools are the most obvious factors.

I call horsepucky and I know you do too. Trauma at home? Chances are the parents and siblings of these students are the ones facing trauma. Less support in schools? Nonsense - kids have 1 to 1s, lunch bunch, social worker teams, school psychologists, counselors and far more mental health support than any school ever imagined necessary. What's changed:

0 Food - it's chemical garbage

0 Vaccinations - more than 72 before first grade today with more in the queue

o Toxic chemicals everywhere, including school classrooms and grounds

o Tampering with the brain in utero with vaccinations, ultrasounds, medication and interactions at birth

o Tylenol at the first sign of any and all discomfort, including at vaccination visits

o Electromagnetic Frequencies

o Screen time

o Reduction in parental authority

o Changing the power structure from parent overseeing child to child bossing parent

And I'm sure there are many more suggestions. Feel free to share them.

Here's an article that is part of an excellent series from Oregon.  Thanks to Laura Hayes for sending it to me. Teachers are not working with teachable material, "normal" children, like their predecessors who taught our parents and grandparents and yes, most of us. Education is Ore-going, going, gone.

###

From KGW-8 NBC TV in Portland, Oregon:

Classrooms in Crisis: Verbal, physical, sometimes violent outbursts plaguing Oregon classrooms

The situation has gotten so dire that the Oregon Education Association – the union that represents 44,000 teachers across the state – plans to release a report this week calling classroom disruptions a “significant and growing problem in Oregon classrooms.”

Note: American children are regressing into a primal state of dysfunctional mental health. They are not naughty. They are not unloved. They are not possessed by demons. Screen time alone isn't destroying their ability to have empathy and control. One could say that even our poorest children living in abject poverty have more luxuries that our grandparents could have imagined. Kids are pathologically unwell. But they don't have the chicken pox, so teachers can be grateful for that as they dodge chairs and fists. Meanwhile, teachers, aides and bus drivers are also cracking up and being violent toward students with special needs. Children are not supposed to need psychiatric care at age 7. Schools nurses are supposed to hand out band aids to boys with scraped knees and feminine pads to frightened 7th grade girls and put cold compresses on a feverish child whose mother has been called. Today's school nurses might as well work under MASH tents for the trauma the see each day. Social workers used to facilitate lunch bunch and counsel children whose parents were in the process of a divorce. We have a monstrous problem on our hands. 

###

By Anne Dachel

Reporters endlessly tell us about INCREASES/CHANGES in the population of disabled children in our schools everywhere in the English speaking world. Despite the serious things they tell, these same reporters just move on to the next topic. There’s never an in-depth follow-up asking critical questions and searching for real answers.

One recent story immediately got my attention, and I felt I had to highlight it.

May 31, 2019, Des Moines, IA, CBS13: Extreme & Violent Student Behavior Pushing Iowa Teachers to Breaking Point 

Iowa teachers tell Channel 13 they are so overwhelmed by extreme violent behavior they have reached a breaking point.  They asked us to share their stories so people will understand what happens inside classrooms.

Ashlee May teaches second grade in Des Moines.  She said, “Most people, I don’t think, realize kind of what’s happening.  We get screamed at and cursed at daily.  I’ve been stabbed with a pencil before.”

Police reports back her up.  They contain stories of children ages 10 and younger throwing chairs, punching teachers in the face, and leaving bruises on instructors.  May considers herself lucky.  “In terms of what other teachers deal with, I think I’ve been kind of blessed because I’ve never had to go to the hospital.”

A teacher whose identity we concealed based on her fear of retaliation from administrators for speaking out told us children “get in the faces of the teachers.”  She said she hears things like, “Get out of my way, you (expletives).  You can’t do anything to me.  I’m not going to get into trouble.  You’re going to get into trouble.  All kinds of intimidation.”

May said, “There just comes a point where you’re just so worn out emotionally, and physically, and mentally that you just can’t do it anymore.”

We’re told, “Teachers have been sounding the alarm privately about extreme behavior for years.”

We hear about “room clears” where a child becomes so violent that other students are in danger and they have to be removed to the hallway. A single student is then left to trash the room.

So why have (elementary) students recently become so disruptive and out-of-control?

The 7 minute news video didn’t have much to say about it except that there are ‘gaps in our social fabric’ and insinuate that parents are at fault. 

“Teachers are tasked with types of nurturing that have never been asked of them, that they weren’t trained for, and state lawmakers haven’t budgeted for.”

Nurturing?

Children seemingly aren’t being nurtured outside of school.

In addition, there is a lack of mental health services that children need.

The interview with a district administer went like this:

“All the gaps in our social fabric that schools are more and more expected to take on, whether that’s private service providers or access to private service providers.”

“Or moms and dads.”

By Anne Dachel

While California politicians focus on removing vaccination rights from healthy citizens, its schools face unheard of budget pressures from ever mounting special education costs.

On May 12 the Los Angeles Times  reported that local school districts were “hitting the panic button” over costs despite a huge 21% increase in the state’s special education budget.

Reporter John Myers pointed to “the rapid growth in expenses for special education.” He wrote, “More children are qualifying for additional services, particularly those diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder.”

MORE CHILDREN ARE QUALIFYING

Many of these kids have really severe and costly needs. ‘When you look at the dollars that reach the actual schools, the increase in overall funding is being outstripped by the increase in mandated costs.’

Back in March, the Marin County Independent Journal  had a similar story. It seems that while enrollment in the district is going down, special education costs are rising. This makes for a big money problem and they have to make budget cuts of $1.8M.

“ ‘This $1.8 million is just the beginning,’” said trustee Ross Millerick, referring to continuing challenges from rising pension costs, declining enrollment and flat per-student revenue from the state.” …

“Hawkins said another significant factor this year was a steep rise in special education costs. … ‘The costs for special education are up over $750,000 this year,’ Hawkins told the board on Tuesday. ‘This is the largest increase in over 20 years.’”…

No one seems willing to ask the obvious in these stories: Why are special education costs and numbers increasingly a problem, especially if enrollment is down?

By Anne Dachel

I often say that regular ed today is really special ed with all the kids who have individual plans and different learning needs.

In the same sense, special ed should actually be called behavioral ed because of what things are like in the modern school setting.

From therapy dogs, to the use of restraint/seclusion and increased mental health services, academics is no longer the sole focus of schools. Education has to change because kids today cannot function normally. It's that simple.

Here are some examples from recent news reports. Taken as a whole they should be scaring everyone. How much time do we have left to fix things?

The content quoted below can be found among the recent stories on LossOfBrainTrust.com

Delaware, OH: Two full-time and two part-time therapists are assigned to Delaware City Schools, she said….

The district also partners with other [mental health] agencies as part of its overall effort to maintain student wellness, she said.

Florida: Florida has an estimated 400,000 children who need behavioral-health services, but 55 percent of them don’t get any treatment, members of a health-care panel were told Thursday.

That translates to 220,000 children across the state, or about one child in every classroom…

Lawmakers this month approved a 2019-2020 state budget that includes $75 million for mental-health services at schools, a boost from the $64 million given to school districts for the current year.

Dublin, Ireland: She is one of a number of Dublin parents who will take part in a protest on Saturday in the city centre, about the lack of school places for their autistic children.

Fairfax County, VA: But last March, a WAMU investigation revealed hundreds of cases in which elementary students in schools designed to serve students with special needs were secluded and restrained. In some cases, children were as young as six. One child was isolated more than 100 times in a school year. …

WAKE UP ARKANSAS! The end is near.

In the midst of a flurry of coverage in the media about the threat posed by measles outbreaks in the U.S., I found a truly frightening story from the Arkansas Democrat Gazette.

State autism-treatment options scarce, but growing was all about how the state government fails children with autism. It seems that in Arkansas, autism is a real problem.

The Democrat Gazette gives readers real things to worry about. It’s the inevitable position every state in the U.S. will be in the next few years.

To summarize: the epidemic of autism shows no signs of slowing down, and there simply aren’t enough services to address it.

Reporter Alex Golden uses the example of a 2 year-old who stopped talking and was diagnosed with autism. Incredibly, Golden says nothing about why a child would regress. It’s just autism.

From there he goes on to talk about THE PRICE TAG OF AUTISM.

Autism costs an average of about $60,000 a year through childhood, with the bulk of the costs in special services and lost wages related to increased demands on one or both parents. Costs increase with the occurrence of intellectual disability.

And it isn’t just the cost of care, what’s worse is the absence of help for these children.

It's also a struggle in Northwest Arkansas to get treatment for children who are on the autism spectrum, a problem that parents and professionals attribute to a lack of services and professionals in the field. …

Golden cites one service provider who just can’t keep up with demand.

Note: Time to bring back Jocko Homo and DEVO - which stood for de-evolution. Happening right under our injection sites.... Are we not men?

By Anne Dachel

Thanks to a friend who passed this on to me, we have some really scary info that raises lots of questions. For a long time I've said, "We'll vaccinate ourselves right back to the Stone Age."

May 22, 2019, NBC News: IQ rates are dropping in many developed countries and that doesn't bode well for humanity

An intelligence crisis could undermine our problem-solving capacities and dim the prospects of the global economy.

People are getting dumber. That's not a judgment; it's a global fact. In a host of leading nations, IQ scores have started to decline. ...

As yet, the United States hasn’t hit this IQ wall — despite what you may be tempted to surmise from the current state of the political debate. But don’t rush to celebrate American exceptionalism: If IQs are dropping in other advanced countries but not here, maybe that means we’re not really an advanced country (too much poverty, too little social support).

Or — just as troubling — if we are keeping up with the Joneses (or Johanssons and Jacques) in terms of national development, that means we are likely to experience similarly plummeting IQs in the near future. At which point, the U.S. will face the same dangers of intellectual and economic stagnation. ...

These days, however, Flynn himself concedes that "the IQ gains of the 20th century have faltered." A range of studies using a variety of well-established IQ tests and metrics have found declining scores across Scandinavia, Britain, Germany, France and Australia.

But the broad pattern has become clearer: Beginning around the turn of the 21st century, many of the most economically advanced nations began experiencing some kind of decline in IQ.

By Anne Dachel

My friend Maurine Meleck, dedicated autism activist, had this letter to the editor published by the Jacksonville (FL) Times Union.

Every April we live the fantasy surrounding autism with blue lights, walks, and puzzle pieces. We’ve been conditioned to think all this is significant. Somehow there’s no need to worry about a disorder overwhelmingly affecting children with no known cause. The fact that the rate keeps on increasing is just more of the mystery.    

Maurine points out the obvious and ignored truth: AUTISM WILL BURY US.

The cost of this disaster will be dumped on the states. While federal officials continue to scratch their collective heads over autism, state governments will have to provide for adults who will live long lives dependent on social services. The autism bill will come due very soon.

We must address autism in a realistic manner

The authors of a recent article urging employers to hire more people on the autism spectrum because it makes good business sense stated that individuals with autism may “differ dramatically from one another.”

This statement is very true.

By Anne Dachel

Someone in the mainstream media actually noticed that something is wrong with our children. On May 9, 2019 Fox News anchor Tucker Carlson editorialized on the state of our children’s health and our elected officials’ failure to deal with it.

The occasion involved the most recent school shooting, namely the one at a Denver-area charter school where a young man was killed trying to stop an assailant. The title of the story was Vultures treat the Colorado shooting like a political prop—our kids deserve so much more, and in it Carlson went from criticizing politicians who use heartbreaking situations and push for gun control to asking the REALLY BIG QUESTION: WHY ARE KIDS TODAY SO DIFFERENT?

Carlson: Congressman Jason Crow and Sen. Michael Bennet, both Democrats, attended the prayer vigil. They were not there to offer prayers. They were there to belittle prayer, and instead hold a campaign rally….

What vultures these people are. The students walked out of the vigil. For the politicians, devastated children and grieving families were just political props -- props they could use to increase their own power at the expense of other people's freedom. That is their reaction to every problem and every tragedy.

This could have been stopped if you have given me more power. Of course, in reality, Washington has been getting more and more power for decades and has not been making our kids happier or healthier. …

There are a lot of possible explanations for this. We don't seem to be talking about any of them. The kids in Colorado were, though. They chanted, "Mental health." And they are right. But it is not enough to say we need more mental healthcare. It is also worth asking why we need it.

Why do so many kids have so many more mental health problems? It's not your imagination. It's real. It is measurable. It is being measured, though not addressed. In the past decade, teen depression has risen dramatically, as have teen suicides. They are connected, of course. Between 2008 and 2017, the percentage of adolescents with depression symptoms rose 52 percent. Among kids 15 to 24, suicides are up almost 50 percent. That's a horrifying number. No one mentions it.

Millions of American children are on drugs for ADHD, anxiety, other mental health problems. But why? What is driving this?

Is it the breakdown in the family? Is it too much screen time? Is it something in the food? We don't really know. That is the actual tragedy. And as long as our leaders' preferred response to this tragedy is opportunism, we never will know.

By Anne Dachel

Two stories out on April 22, 2019 make it clear that we are expected to accept ANY INCREASE, ANY RATE in childhood illness or disabilities, especially when it comes to the “A” WORD—AUTISM.

By an odd coincidence a piece from Scotland and one from Syracuse, NY both use the word “soaring” to describe increases in autism/special needs.

The report from Scotland defies reason.

Herald: Number of pupils with special needs 'soaring'

The number of pupils requiring support for mental health problems has more than tripled between 2012 and 2018, up 252 per cent.

Those with communication support needs have increased by 293% in the same period, while pupils identified as having autism spectrum disorder have more than doubled, rising by 101%.

Students needing help at school for physical health problems have risen by 98% in the six-year period, while those with social, emotional and behavioural difficulties have increased by 86%.

Students with dyslexia have risen 60% …

Then we are told that all these disabled children are merely due “to increased recognition and diagnosis of conditions, as well as improvements in recording.”

By Anne Dachel

On my website, LossOfBrainTrust.com, I continue to post stories on the decline of education and childhood in the 21^st century.  I can only conclude that this disaster will never be addressed for what it is by officials. SOMEHOW we’ll just struggle on until everything collapses. These stories are just a sample and they speak for themselves. I really have no words of my own for this

April 21, 2019, (UK) Telegraph: Seven-year-old boy threatened to stab pregnant teacher in stomach as union warns of rise in pupil violence

A seven-year-old boy threatened to stab a pregnant teacher in the stomach over a literacy lesson, it emerges as a union warns of a rise in children who do not respond to any form of punishment.

…families need to be held accountable for their children’s behaviour, explaining: “If your child is constantly disruptive, if they are violent, if they are abusive, I think it’s about time that schools and teachers question the parenting of those children.

April 20, 2019, (Canada) Study Finds: Study: 1 In 5 Children Suffers From A Mental Health Disorder 

One in five children suffer from a mental disorder — with notable increases in depression and anxiety over the past 30 years — yet less than one- third have had contact with a mental healthcare provider, a new study finds.

April 20, 2019, (Canada) Durham (ON) Region: Durham school board expecting 350 to 400 more students with autism over the next year Board chair says budget process will be 'very difficult' 

The Durham District School Board is anticipating an influx of students with autism over the next year, as a result of changes to Ontario’s autism program.

A new report says an additional 350 to 400 students with autism who have "significant needs" are expected by winter 2020 — about triple the normal amount.

April 20, 2019, (UK) Guardian: One in four teachers 'experience violence from pupils every week'—Many say poor behaviour is making them want to leave the profession, NASUWT finds

One in four teachers in the UK say they experience physical violence from their pupils at least once a week, and many say poor behaviour is making them want to leave the profession, according to figures compiled by a teaching union….

Nearly nine in 10 teachers said they had received some sort of verbal or physical abuse from pupils in the past year. Eighty-six per cent said they had been sworn at and 46% said they had been verbally threatened….

“Having taught for almost 40 years I have witnessed a demonstrable and seemingly unstoppable deterioration in pupil behaviour,” one said.

April 19, 2019, Fox26, Fresno, CA: Sinclair Cares: Popular places catering to autistic children

By Anne Dachel

Dr. Walter Zahorodny from Rutgers is EVERYWHERE in print and broadcast news right now talking about the ALARMING, GROWING AUTISM RATE IN NJ which he says will continue to get even worse.

Science Daily put it this way.

A new report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which uses research by Rutgers University, shows a significant increase in the percentage of 4-year-old children with autism spectrum disorder in New Jersey.

 The study found the rate increased 43 percent from 2010 to 2014 in the state.

The report, released April 11, found that about one in 59 children has autism. New Jersey's rate was the highest of the states studied: one in 35. That puts the national rate of autism at 1.7 percent of the childhood population and New Jersey's autism rate at 3 percent.

…The analysis of this young group of children shows U.S. autism rates are continuing to rise without plateauing.

"It's very likely that the next time we survey autism among children, the rate will be even higher," [Zahorodny] said....

The researchers can't explain why autism rates have increased across the United States. Factors associated with a higher risk include advanced parental age (children of parents over age 30 have heightened risk), maternal illness during pregnancy, genetic mutations, birth before 37 weeks gestation and multiple births.

"These are true influences exerting an effect, but they are not enough to explain the high rate of autism prevalence," said Zahorodny. "There are still undefined environmental risks that contribute to this significant increase, factors that could affect a child in its development in utero or related to birth complications or to the newborn period. We need more research into non-genetic triggers for autism."

IT IS DESPICABLE, in my opinion, for this medical expert to make these idiotic claims about causation.

IN 2012 on  NY radio he admitted that YES, VACCINES ARE LINKED TO AUTISM.  I wrote about it 2015.

Media Heats Up on Vaccine Debate

Back in April, 2012, Zahorodny was featured on the Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC radio.

http://www.irishbeo.com/Irish_Beo/School_Stories/School_Stories.html

Note: Here is just one take away from this article, and the same thing is happening here in the USA. Dec 1, 2018, (Ireland) Extra IE: 33 teachers took leave this academic year after being assaulted by pupils. Assault. Behavior. Students in pain and frustrated. Teachers ill equipped for this new normal. 

We'll be wearin’ the green this weekend, the Chicago River will flow green, the beer will flow from coast to coast as America celebrates St. Patrick's Day on the 17th.  Who can drive out the scourge of autism on Ireland's children?  And yes, for most, it is indeed a scourge.

By Anne Dachel

A recent story on from Ireland got my attention. It’s proof that those in charge will never recognize the decline of children. Sinn Fein representative Kathleen Funchion comes across as a champion of disabled students.  She’s adamant that more needs to be done for autistic kids in Ireland, all the while pretending that autism is a normal and acceptable part of childhood.

Mar 7, 2019, (Ireland) Kilkenny Now: Kathleen Funchion: ‘Why are autistic children being treated differently in Kilkenny?’ 

Sinn Fein official asks:

Why is there an acute shortage of ASD classes for secondary students in Kilkenny?...

Concerned parents have approached me over recent months over their fear that there will be no secondary school places in Kilkenny for their child when the time for them to enrol arrives.

This concern is not an arbitrary fear, it is based on parents’ experiences approaching secondary schools in our constituency and being told there is little hope for their child’s admission to a school that provides an ASD class or that the waiting list is full….

The good news is, autism really isn’t a problem. We’re just noticing it more.  We need to provide more room in schools.

…Every school in our constituency needs to acknowledge that diagnostic rates are increasing among our population and we must deliver for that changing demographic….

In fact, all the autistic children bankrupting Irish schools are a sign of progress.

We are fortunate to be living in a time in Ireland where these diagnoses are happening more readily and gone are the days of simply ignoring a child who appears to be ‘different’….

Funchion, of course, is presiding over the end of childhood as we’ve always known it. Her lack of interest in the explosion in autism (and special education in general in Ireland) is outrageous. It brings to mind the real meaning of the charge, “callous disregard.” Her pretense that the autism epidemic is just something we need to adjust to, defies common sense and endangers the future of the Republic.

Funchion sees the neglect rampant in Irish schools as one isolated worry that can be fixed with more places for kids with ASD.  Special education is the biggest problem in education in Ireland, but she is oblivious to it all.

Here are just some of the recent stories about Ireland that I’ve posted on LossOfBrainTrust.com

They  that should have the attention of everyone in the government in Ireland, including Kathleen Funchion. Schools are being overwhelmed by students who can’t learn or behave normally in the classroom.  Meanwhile those in charge tell us it isn’t happening.

Mar 1, 2019, (Ireland) Kildare Nationalist: Official opening of school's sensory room 

Acting principal Ross Dignam said students with sensory needs and self-regulation requirements will find that the features of this room will be of great benefit when seeking sensory stimulation.

“The room will allow a student to regulate themselves for a short period so that they can re-engage with their other learning activities in a more concentrated way,” he said.

Mr Dignam  explained that there will  be a maximum of three students in the sensory room at any one time, as the room is not for ordinary classroom work but instead will act as “an aid to self-regulation between learning activities” for the school’s pupils…

By Anne Dachel

Recent news stories here are ones that we should all be concerned about.  They’re part of the 3,900+ reports I’ve posted on Loss of Brain Trust. 

Most of the articles are from other countries, especially Britain, so it’s clear that the decline of childhood is happening simultaneously around the world. Disabled and dysfunctional children are overwhelming school budgets and classroom teachers, yet there is no real alarm, no demand for answers.

The reader is left with one thought: How long can this go on?

Mar 4, 2019, (Canada) Toronto Star: Schools unprepared for influx of kids with autism, principals say 

Most school staff aren’t trained to “treat, teach or manage” children with autism — and boards aren’t ready for an influx of students in a few weeks’ time when changes to the autism program come into effect, warn Ontario principals. …

As of April 1, families will be eligible for up to $20,000 a year for each child under 6, to a lifetime maximum of $140,000, to be used for the services of their choice. Children older than that can access up to $5,000 a year up to age 18, to a lifetime maximum of $55,000. …

Mar 4, 2019, (UK) Kent Online:  Children waiting up to two years for ADHD, autism and dyslexia diagnosis

Children in Kent showing signs of ADHD, autism, dyslexia or learning and communication disorders are spending two years without a formal diagnosis.

^{Mar 4, 2019, (UK) Gloucestershire Live: These are the number of kids kicked out of school and here’s why}

Half of the 139 permanent exclusions were pupils with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND).

The findings, released by Gloucestershire County Council in a report, also reveal the state of an increasing number of kids being home-schooled in the county. …

According to the report, the most common reason for permanent exclusions in primary school is persistent disruptive behaviour.

There has also been a rise in the number of pupils permanently excluded for physical assault against an adult or pupil, from five to seven…..

^{Mar 4, 2019, (UK) North Somerset Times: Improvements to special education needs funding approved} 

The amount spent on children with SEND is increasing and the funds available do not match demand….

However, an increasing number of pupils with complex needs are managed in mainstream schools. …

Paul Shattuck

By Anne Dachel

This is the frightening future for the coming generation(s) of autistic children in America:  DENIAL.

Anyone who reads the Feb 20, 2019 piece in The Atlantic entitled,The Coming Care Crisis as Kids With Autism Grow Up—The number of adults with autism diagnoses is soaring, but there aren’t enough programs and services to meet the demand, by writer and doctoral candidate Noah Remnick,  will understand that members of the press just don’t care.

First of all, the “crisis” Remnick sees when it comes to autism is the lack of services for adults. AUTISM itself is not a crisis, in fact Remnick assures us that autism has always been here, we just didn’t notice.

Although people with autism have always existed, the United States saw a tremendous spike in diagnoses beginning in the late 1990s, due in part to increased public awareness of the disorder and improvements in evaluation.

How is that possible?  How could educators, parents, and doctors over many past generations never have recognized the collective signs and symptoms of autism? Why have schools during the last twenty years had to train teachers to deal with autistic students? (We’ve had disabled children in school by federal law for the past 45 years.)

Remnick acknowledges that the explosion in autism among children began in the last 90s, yet the statistics he cites to compare are from AFTER THE 1990s.

About one in every 59 children is diagnosed with autism, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, up from one in every 150 in 2000.

By Anne Dachel

As the saying goes, “the more things change, the more they stay the same.” If you want a current example of that regarding autism numbers, you have only to look at the January 21, 2019 piece from the Sacramento Bee by Michael Finch II.  

Notice the stunning title: Special education enrollment in California is up. No one can say exactly why.

It was the same sense of mystery that always surrounds coverage of autism and for good reason.

The Modesto Bee, the Napa Valley Register, and the San Luis Obispo Tribune quickly republished the Sac Bee piece, and even though the headline talked about special education, the piece was almost entirely about the exploding number of kids with autism in California schools.

The story started with the example of twin boys who, according to their mom, a physician’s assistant, were “normal and healthy at first” and later diagnosed with autism and cerebral palsy.

Of course it isn’t just autism happening to SPED, but it’s an overwhelming part of the story.

Special education enrollment has surged in the last decade, with more than 96,000 students pouring into school districts across the state, according to data from the California Department of Education.

One of the drivers has been a marked increase in students with autism and other behavioral delays, a Bee analysis shows. At the same time, the number of students with other disabilities grew modestly or decreased between the 2009 and 2018 school years.

Once again, Finch retreated to the standard autism shoulder shrug:

Although the trend is undeniable, no one can say exactly why it’s happening.

More of the mystery.

Brian Peterson, Star Tribune

Note: Harsh words in that headline? Maybe. The wall is divisive enough. It's tangible and easy to make a fast mental picture. Special Education is not as easy to imagine.  Special Education will pit parent against parent. From our Anne Dachel, a story that ran yesterday from Minnesota. Years ago, we began reporting on the catastrophic birth of autism within the Somali immigrant population.  Dec 17, 2013, MinnPost.com: Autism highest among Minneapolis' Somali and white children, U study finds Take note of the beautiful child in the photo. Somali.

"We don't need no education. We don't need no thought control." Pink Floyd

###

By Anne Dachel

Saturday, Jan 19, the Minneapolis Star Tribune posted a very concerning piece online entitled, Minnesota schools facing 'crisis level' in special education funding. 

It was featured on the front page of the Sunday Star Tribune.

The COST of special education is increasingly a financial calamity for schools in the state with no signs of leveling off.

The response to this headline from any thinking person would be, why? Why is the cost of SPED now a crisis?

Of course school districts have no choice but to address this because the federal government mandates that they provide a free and appropriate education for every student, even the most disabled children.

The Star Tribune reported:

School administrators say the mandate's growing financial burden is threatening their ability to provide the same for all students. 

Soaring special education costs are squeezing the budgets of Minnesota schools — and quickly becoming school districts’ top priority for the new legislative session.

School administrators are quick to note that they cannot — and would not — deny special education students their right to an education that meets their needs, no matter the cost. But they say the mandate’s growing financial burden is threatening their ability to provide the same for all students.

So what happens when the cost of SPED students sucks dry the funds for regular ed kids?

By Anne Dachel

Dr. Orit Stoller, a pediatric neurologist with ALUT, the Israeli Society for Children and Adults with Autism

No matter what kinds of increases are happening, nothing will be done to address them. I’m convinced of it. Stories about more and more special education students, more diagnosed with autism, ADHD, dyslexia, mental problems should be getting everyone’s attention, but the old bromides about better diagnosing/greater awareness show no signs of going away.

One of the first Loss of Brain Trust website stories of the new year is a chilling example of how education is changing around the world.

On Jan 3, 2018, (Israel) Haaetz published the story, Israel Sees 12 Fold Increase in Autistic Children in Special Ed Since 2000, by Shira Kadari-Ovadia.

'Israel’s increase is exceptional': In 2000 there were 894 autistic children in special education, in 2018 the number has grown to 11,145 …

The number of autistic children in special education has grown more than 12-fold in less than two decades, from 894 in 2000 to 11,145 in 2018, a new report said.

Calm down.  One in every 40 kids with autism is nothing to worry about.

Once again the officialdom in Atlanta [the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] has announced that the autism rate is higher than previously believed, and once again, we’re told that IT DOESN’T MEAN MORE CHILDREN ACTUALLY HAVE AUTISM.

I’ve been writing on this phenomenon over the last couple of decades.

EACH AND EVERY TIME an update in the numbers came out, there was ALWAYS the caveat added by some expert and featured by all in the mainstream media that assured the public that the new rate was nothing to worry about—no real change.

When the news broke on the latest findings, I could predict that every major news outlet covering it would ONCE AGAIN deny any real increase and would ONCE AGAIN attribute the numbers to better counting and greater awareness. And this time we’re told it’s also due to different methods of gathering data.

The message to the American people ONCE AGAIN is: AUTISM IS NOT, NOR WILL IT EVER BE, A CRISIS.  

Remember back to last April when the rate of one in 59 U.S. children was announced?

THE NEW JERSEY RATE CITED AT THAT TIME WAS ONE IN EVERY 34 CHIDREN (one in every 22 boys).  You’d think people would have been in a panic to explain the NJ numbers—why the big difference?  (Or why there is NEVER a comparable rate of autism found among ADULTS.)

Note: No one has done more to ring the bell of alarm over the autism epidemic worldwide than our own Anne Dachel. Here, she reports on a similar disconnect between the difficult reality of autism's never ending climb and what seems to be a hallucinatory denial of the severity.   There is no known cause, just coincidence.  Dr. Wazed Hossain knows in her very heart of hearts (insert gag) that it is NOT vaccines - that theory has never been replicated (wrong) and has been "debunked."  When  you read the word debunked you must ALWAYS put on your bull&hit goggles. It's a playbook code word. No matter the topic. Debunked means, dismissed.

By Anne Dachel

An article published on Oct 23, 2018 by a news source in Sri Lanka shows just how paralyzed experts are when it comes to addressing autism.

The piece, Autism may reach epidemic proportions in Lanka, warns WHO expert Dr. Saima Wazed Hossain,   contains a maze of remarks that will only leave the reader mystified. 

Hossain, "an expert on neuro-developmental disorders," is actually very clever at double speak. Take your pick of her views from this interview:

She sounds worried about the rising rate.

 "Autism has reached alarming numbers worldwide, and that it may reach epidemic proportions in Sri Lanka."

 "It is an increasing number all over the world." 

And in the same breath she chalks it up to better diagnosing, no real increase.

 "It is believed, awareness and better diagnostic mechanisms are exposing more and more numbers that would not have come to light otherwise."

She tells us to be patient when it comes to finding the cause of autism.

"No specific cause has been established for the rise. It takes time to know if there is a connection to our changing lifestyle, if something related is causing this genetic mutation to effect."

Hossain cites DDT exposure, cosmetics, and processed food as possibly linked to autism.

Again she focuses on an increase.

The first article I found on Saturday, October 20^th made me stop my news search. It was about a 10 year boy in County Cork, Ireland and the desperate situation faced by him and his family.

I couldn’t get over the number of things affecting this child that were mentioned in this piece.

This story talked about depression, autism, suicide attempts, anxiety, mental illness, meltdowns, sensory processing disorder, dysregulation disorder (and head and stomach pain)—all in one little boy!

It also described a system that’s broken. This mother is at the end of her rope. She faces endless waiting lists and constant worry about her son’s actions, especially his anger issues affecting the whole family.

What really stood out to me was the fact that all the problems his mother described are now common in American schools. Issues long associated WITH AUTISM are increasingly recognized in kids WITHOUT an ASD diagnosis.  

Scary stuff

I have now compiled over 3,000 stories since January 2017   on the declining health and performance of children.

Schools EVERYWHERE in the world are dealing with exploding special education numbers, huge behavioral and sensory issues, self-harm, violence, and anxiety.  We’re now used to horrific rates of neurological/behavioral disorders profoundly affecting CHILDREN.

Where’s the alarm?

By Anne Dachel

Sept 25, 2018, My Central Jersey published the piece, New Jersey Autism Center of Excellence http://njace.us/ established at Rutgers University

The latest from the state with the highest rate of autism is a report that announced the creation of the NJ Autism Center of Excellence.  The NJACE is there to “improve research, treatment and services for people with autism spectrum disorder (ASD).”

Elizabeth Torres, associate professor of psychology at Rutgers, one of the heads of the center said she hopes that they’ll become a model for programs around the U.S.

We were told about the stunning difference between the national rate and the autism numbers in New Jersey alone.

“While autism affects one in 59 children in United States, one in 34 children has the disorder in New Jersey.” (And it should be added that among boys, the New Jersey rate is one in 22.)

Torres talked about the lack of insurance coverage, the need for therapy and the absence of employment opportunities for people with autism.

James Millonig, an associate professor in neuroscience and cell biology at Rutgers, is also part of the leadership of the NJACE. He promised to focus on research, treatment and employment for people with autism. They’re going to be working with the New Jersey Autism Council ‘in order to advance and disseminate the understanding, treatment, and management of ASD.’

Our Anne Dachel puts out daily reports from around the world about the decline of pediatric health including the sharp increase in mental health problems.  "Worrisome" is an understatement used by US News (no friend to autism or vaccine injury) designed to keep the panic low. We don't panic, we don't have that luxury. We will sound the alarm.  A Presidential alert would be nice too. Insert eye roll emoji here. The lack of concern from the White House following promises that have disappeared into the ether is.... worrisome.

WED UPDATE: https://www.lossofbraintrust.com/

SIX STORIES:  3 from the U.S., one from the U.K., 2 from Ireland

US News: (Another of the mainstream outlines that has IGNORED the rapid decline in the mental/behavioral/physical wellbeing of children)

We’re told MENTAL HEALTH/BEHAVIORAL ISSUES ARE RISING AMONG KIDS. It’s pretty bad. We’re told 20%, even 25% of kids are affected.

No explanation is given. The AAP is calling for universal screening.

ALSO: “Rising rates of anxiety, autism spectrum disorder and aggression are also worrisome….”

Maryland: Governor okays new student app so they can report threats to schools.

DeKalb County, GA: Autistic 13 yr old stabs another student with a scissors at school today. 

Ireland: An autistic child costs $41K (US dollars) per family. $21K in social services.

UK: New SPED school to cost $4.5M (US dollars). Kids who can’t be educated in regular schools.

UK: SPED teachers in Ireland are asking for training in restraint use with out-of-control students.

By Anne Dachel

(UK) Bath and North East Somerset Council: ‘We are all on the autistic spectrum’

Britain has surrendered to the loss of its children. They’ve given up without a fight, much like the U.S. has done. Nothing could make that fact clearer than what happened at a meeting of the Bath and North East Somerset Council on September 13^th when the subject was autism.

The meeting was covered in Somerset Live  in a piece entitled, Motion backed to ensure people with autism in Bath and North East Somerset get the help they need.

“People with autism” makes it sound like autism effects all ages equally, yet the article was almost exclusively about children with autism and their needs.

The words “child” and “children” were both used throughout the piece.

“He said he knows of a child who needed…”

“…children waiting years for a diagnosis.”

‘Every child deserves an equal chance…’

‘We have to get children suspected of having autism …’

The only reference to adults on the spectrum was from one council member who mentioned that his partner recently was diagnosed with Asperger’s (as if an independent adult with a claim of high functioning autism is comparable to the non-verbal, aggressive 16 year old still in diapers).

‘We are all on the autistic spectrum’

Bath council member Tim Ball went so far as to declare, ‘We are all on the autistic spectrum at some point’—a  statement that showed he either has no understanding of what huge numbers of parents are dealing with, or he’s trying to make autism into a normal and acceptable part of the human condition. 

By Anne Dachel

Here is my update on childhood in the 21^st century as shown in news coverage from the past week. It’s impossible to think that officials are blind to what’s happening everywhere. What will it take for them to admit this is an absolute disaster that simply can’t continue?

Here are ten stories that prove my point.

Austin, TX: School nurses have to deal with the decline in children's health. Children today have problems unlike anything kids experienced a decade or two ago.

Aug 24, 2018, Austin (TX) Statesman: What does the school nurse want to know about your child? A lot.

If you think school nursing is just about taking temperatures and handing out bandages, a visit to the Kids First workshop at the University of Texas School of Nursing proves you wrong pretty quickly.

During the course of two days earlier this month, about 300 nurses from districts around Central Texas learned the latest in managing ADHD, diabetes and mental health disorders, how to recognize child abuse and how to look for signs of stress and sleep deprivation in students…..

What has changed is some of the things that are coming into nurses’ offices that weren’t decades ago. Mental health crises, particularly depression and anxiety, and problems with stress management come into the office more frequently, says Violet Filley, who has been a nurse for 23 years and works with sixth-graders to 12th-graders at Round Rock Opportunity Center. …

Laconia, NH: Parents are asked to fill out ADVERSE CHILDHOOD EXPERIENCE forms about their children.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has supplied the “science” showing that trauma at home is profoundly affecting children. Parents are responsible for disruptive students.

Aug 25, 2018, Laconia (NH) Daily: Laconia school tackling challenges of childhood trauma

By Anne Dachel

Welcome to a two part Skype talk with New York attorney Patricia Finn.  Patricia explains her work in vaccine court representing children injured by vaccines, and she advises parents seeking a religious or medical vaccine exemption in New York State.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IQBx-1I_tPo&t=11s

Hi everybody. My name is Patricia Finn. I’m an attorney.

I’ve been an attorney for fifteen years. The minute I got out of law school, I hung up my shingle, and I was looking at constitutional issues, First Amendment issues, religious freedom things that were very important to me personally.

Right out of the gate I was flooded with requests from parents seeking religious exemptions to vaccination.

To be honest with you, I didn’t at the time know very much about autism and vaccine injury.

I knew about the constitutional issues involving parental rights… I didn’t know how big it is and how hard it would be—and it has been hard. It’s been very, very hard, but rewarding. …

I represent about 10,000 families right now. We’ve been very successful. I’ve brought about a hundred law suits in vaccine court for vaccine injuries, civil rights cases involving religious exemptions.

I’m a litigator, and I’ve cut my teeth. I’m here to help

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b1QGEOMgwWg&t=2s

“I’m going to talk to you a little bit about the school exemption process. What that means is, if you’re a parent, and you do not want to vaccinate your child, and you want them to go to a public school, …  If your child is not vaccinated, you cannot participate in these programs unless you get an exemption.

“I’m going to talk a little bit about the exemption process in New York, which is a little unique in that it is highly exercised….There’s been a ton of litigation here in New York. I’ve brought multiple cases, and there was lawyer before me named James Filenbaum, who brought a very important case called Sharon Levy v. Northport .

By Anne Dachel

Over the past week science has once again spoken on the declining health of children in the 21^st century. And like the autism epidemic we celebrate every April, it’s nothing to really be concerned about, besides no one can explain why it’s happening anyway.

I’m talking about the findings that CNN, CNBC, Fox News, TIME and other sources announced recently, namely that 10% of kids today have ADHD, up from the previously accepted 6%.

The headlines sounded worrisome.

ABC NEWS: ADHD rates in kids have increased over the past 20 years, new study says

CNN: 10% of  US children diagnosed with ADHD, study finds

Fox News: ADHD diagnoses may be rising in US

TIME: One in 10 U.S. Kids Has Been Diagnosed with ADHD    

No need to panic. In the actual text, all of the reports immediately downplayed the new rate with a whole host of reasons that disprove any real increase. Most of them were right out of the THERE AREN’T REALLY MORE KIDS WITH AUTISM playbook that officials have used for years. And it always helps to have folks with lots of credentials from big name institutions to back up the claims.

ABC News:  (The old “expanded spectrum” explanation.)

The way the disorder is evaluated likely plays a part.

"The diagnosis and assessment for ADHD has evolved over the past few decades. The diagnostic criteria that we use is now a little more liberal and captures cases that the older criteria would have left out," said Dr. Neha Chaudhary, a child psychiatrist at the Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Medical School and co-founder of Stanford Brainstorm, in an interview with ABC news.

by Anne Dachel

One of my favorite historians is Thomas Cahill who’s written all kinds of books on European history, including Jewish history and Irish history. It’s very insightful and revealing writing. 

One book covering the 20^th century had a couple of lines that stood out to me. They were on the rise of Fascism in Europe in the 1920s and 30s, which eventually led to the tyranny of Nazism and the savagery of World War II.  

"To us, reading history backward, the rise of Fascism in Europe has all the goosestepping inevitability of Leni Riefenstahl's Triumph of the Will. But through the twenties and thirties many Europeans refused to acknowledge the direction in which events were heading." 

This is what all the stories I’m collecting seem like to me. We will eventually pay a huge price for the decline in the health and behavior of our children that we see happening everywhere. Coming up with all kinds of programs and innovations while pretending nothing is really wrong can’t prevent the inevitable. 

How will we accommodate today’s children when they reach adulthood? All the issues in these stories will still be here. Mental health and behavior problems are the most critical topics to educators today. Adding more security, guidance counselors, psychologists, sensory rooms, and therapy dogs won’t change things at all.

Looking over the past week I picked out ten stories from Loss of Brain Trust that really prove my point about what’s happening in schools.

(New Zealand) "A growing number of young people...[suffer] from some form of mental illness"

Aug 17, 2018, Stuff: The rise and rise of mental illness among our young 

In the 15 to 25 age group presentations increased from 209 to 330 in the same time period. And there was a 154 per cent increase in people from that age group calling the Mental Health Crisis team, now called the Assessment and Brief Care team (ABC), for help - up from 854 in 2013 to 2168 in 2017. 

In Taranaki the number of people in the 10 to 14 age group being prescribed anti depressants went up from 240 in 2013 to 417 in 2017, and from 1063 to 1944 in the 15 to 19 age group. 

Nationally, 10,146 children in the 10 to 14 age group were prescribed antidepressants in 2017 and 56,700 in the older age group. And 1788 children under the age of nine were also prescribed anti depressants.

And of course parents are receiving the blame for the way they raise their kids.

By Anne Dachel

On August 4^th the New York Times published an opinion piece entitled, Anti-Vaccine Activists Have Taken Vaccine Science Hostage.

In that article, science and health writer Melinda Wenner Moyer sounded worried about the increasing number of parents who don’t vaccinate their kids. Moyer is sure these parents have nothing to worry about, but “what drives these wrongheaded decisions is fear — fear that vaccines are somehow dangerous, even though research shows the opposite.”

Despite her belief that no one needs to question the ever-expanding vaccine schedule, Moyer did talk about “hitting a wall” when she tried to discuss vaccine efficacy and safety with researchers. “When I did get them on the phone, a worrying theme emerged: Scientists are so terrified of the public’s vaccine hesitancy that they are censoring themselves, playing down undesirable findings and perhaps even avoiding undertaking studies that could show unwanted effects.”

“The goal is to protect vaccines”

Moyer made it sound as though pressure from “anti-vaccine activists” makes it impossible for scientists to openly talk about possible problems with a vaccine. She cited vaccine developer Dr. Paul Offit who feels that “worrying studies” shouldn’t be published.

It seems that public faith in vaccines is so precarious that EVEN TALKING about side effects scares people away from vaccinating. AND the anti-vaccine community is to blame for this situation. They will go after anything that raises questions about vaccine safety.

Moyer concluded:

There’s no question that bad vaccine science does not deserve a forum — and much of the research cited by anti-vaccine activists is very bad indeed. But good science needs to be heard even if some people will twist its meaning. One thing vaccine scientists and vaccine-wary parents have in common is a desire for the safest and most effective vaccines possible — but vaccines can’t be refined if researchers ignore inconvenient data. Moreover, vaccine scientists will earn a lot more public trust, and overcome a lot more unfounded fear, if they choose transparency over censorship.

So is vaccine research really open and honest? Can any legitimate concerns be raised?

I contacted Dr. Chris Shaw, Canadian neuroscientist and professor of ophthalmology at the University of British Columbia. Dr. Shaw’s research on the use of aluminum vaccine adjuvants had been retracted from the Journal of Inorganic Biochemistry in 2017. 

(In 2012 I interviewed him about his research.)

Here’s what Dr. Shaw had to say about the NY Times story.

Dr. Shaw, what is your opinion of the Times piece? Are “anti-vaccine activists” to blame for shutting down legitimate debate on vaccines?

I think religion adds a lot to human affairs, in many cases, but also goes to extremism.

I was in Mosul as a medic in 2017. We were there to support the civilians coming out of Mosul, and support the military forces that were taking the city back from ISIS.

ISIS is an example of taking religion to an extreme. If you were not one hundred percent what they believe, you were an apostate and you had to be killed….

WHAT YOU SEE IN THIS ARTICLE—you can see the author is struggling really hard to make it come out a certain way—everything in this article points to the fact that the scientists who are honestly trying to do their jobs and find whatever there is to find, whether it’s good or whether it’s bad, or ambiguous, they are being penalized for being honest scientists—even by their own.

In some people’s eyes, they have crossed a path, they’re going against the creed of the religion. And Paul Offit typifies it perfectly.

Everything has to be one hundred percent pro. It cannot be ninety-nine percent pro, that’s not good enough. Papers should never be published if they’re critical, …they might scare the people, the ignorant unwashed masses who won’t get their vaccines.

Offit, as you know, he typifies what I think you’d call MEDICAL FASCISM.

By Anne Dachel

Week update: July 28 to Aug 4

While no one in the national media and no one in the federal government have taken any interest, our schools continue to decline. Here’s a sample from the past week from my big collection on LossofBrainTrust.com . 

I look for stories on INCREASES in numbers and cost. This is proof that the situation isn’t stable, it’s only getting worse. STILL, there are no calls for answers. No alarms. New schools for special needs kids are described with words like ‘exciting’ and ‘fantastic.’

My friend Louis Conte called the situation “a slow moving catastrophe.”  I have over 2,700 articles gathered over the last year and a half, and they’re all frightening. I feel like it is a ticking time bomb, as one piece described it. Eventually schools will be unable to accommodate all the kids with learning disorders, behavior problems and mental health issues, and still educate kids. It’s that simple.

We’re being told that schools in Massachusetts spend 20—30% of their budgets on SPED, Prescott, AZ reports, “The special education student population has outpaced overall student growth,” in  Bridgwater, England they’re spending $24M (US dollars) for a SPED school for 160 students, and in Belfast the school budget is overspending by $25M (US dollars) because of special education costs. So when things finally just collapse, no one will be able to say that we weren’t told it was happening. It’s out there every single day. No one cares.

July 28, 2018, (UK) Isle of Wight County Press: Isle of Wight school dog Poppy receives top award

STUDENTS aren't the only ones achieving at St George’s School.

School dog Poppy — who has been supporting students at the special school for three years, helping to boost their self esteem, reduce anxiety and comfort them when they are upset — has been awarded 'Pets as Therapy' status….

July 28, 2018, Las Vegas Review Journal: 2 new psychologists to provide autism diagnosis in Las Vegas

Clinical neuropsychologists Erin Honke and Caitlin Cook will provide diagnostic services for families needing initial and follow-up evaluations for their autistic children at, respectively, Touro University Nevada’s Center for Autism and Developmental Disabilities and UNLV’s Ackerman Autism Center.

Both say they look forward to being a part of the solution to long wait times for families desperate for early intervention. …

 “It’s also crazy to see how many families have gone without and are waiting to be seen, and that’s certainly something I’m excited to be a part of.” …

There are 3,200 children waiting for help from the UNLV Ackerman Autism Center alone. …

July 29, 2018, (UK) Somerset Live: Here's what Bridgwater new £18M [$24M US] specialist school may look like 

Bridgwater residents have been given their first tentative glimpse of what their town's new £18M [$24M US dollars] specialist school may look like.

Somerset County Council announced its intention in May to build a new 160-place special school on Bower Lane Somerset County Council, not far from the community hospital….

Elmwood school, meanwhile, will be converted to provide more capacity at Robert Blake school.

This project is part of the council's strategy to ensure pupils with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) can be educated closer to home. …

By Anne Dachel

School districts are working on their budgets, and they have to deal with some huge money issues. First of all, security is foremost in the minds of the people running our education system.  They have to be proactive, doing everything possible to prevent another tragedy like the Parkland from happening in their schools.

Teachers are being trained to recognize possible perpetrators among their students. News reports tell us about districts screening students for mental health issues, hiring more social workers, counselors, psychologists, and partnering with local mental health agencies.

It’s abundantly clear that sending your child to school today involves a risk. Teachers face the real threat of violence from their students. The media off-handedly tells us that one in every 5 kids has a mental illness.  (No explanation given. It’s just the way it is.) Teachers need to worry every time they walk into a classroom.  They better be prepared for the worst.

So while districts spend millions on security and hiring more staff to make schools safer, the special education numbers keep on growing and that means higher costs too.

Here’s a sample of what’s happening from my site, Loss of Brain Trust—Childhood Lost over the past week.

July 22, 2018, North Andover (MA) Eagle Tribune:  Surging costs prompt new approach to school funding

… Last week, the House approved spending $500 million over the next five years to help districts better cover the costs of special education and employee health care. At the same time, lawmakers opted to study the issue of helping English language learners and poorer students.

Special education costs contributed to a nearly $4 million school budget deficit in Methuen last year….

In fiscal 2018, the district covered costs for 136 special needs students in residential, private day or collaborative programs -- about 25 more students than during the prior year.

July 22, 2018, Carroll County (MD) Times: Editorial: Getting to root of behavioral issues in elementary school students 

For the past few years, Carroll County Public Schools has asked for additional funding in its budget to repurpose several teaching positions to behavioral specialists. But despite the county’s overall funding for public schools increasing, shortfalls in meeting the Board of Education’s total funding request have left those positions from becoming a reality.

By Anne Dachel

Over the last 18 months I’ve posted hundreds of disturbing news reports about mental illness and young people on my site LossofBrainTrust.com , but this one from NBC News is especially chilling.  I had to give it individual attention. It’s about children in desperate need of emergency psychiatric help, with nowhere to turn. The NBC News people, including anchor Lester Holt, show concern, they call for better insurance coverage, more accommodations, BUT in the end, they willing accept the two terrifying statistics they give us:

“A 40 percent increase in [pediatric] psychiatric visits to emergency rooms,” and the graphic displayed behind Holt in the newsroom, “1 in 5 kids at risk.”

Where did these incredible numbers come from? Over how long a period did ER psych visits increase 40 percent?

Notice that boy in the report has non-verbal autism along with disruptive mood disregulation disorder. Could there be link? How many other behavioral disorders are concomitant with autism? 

(Actually disruptive mood disregulation disorder is a relatively new condition, having been added to the DSM in 2013.)  

June 29, 2018, NBC News: Shortage of in-patient psychiatric beds puts kids at risk as more seek care 

With a 40 percent increase in psychiatric visits to emergency rooms, many families are struggling to find help

Video:

… “My brother can’t actually speak. He has that kind of autism.”

“Twelve-year-old Jake has a sweet disposition, but also suffers from disruptive mood disregulation disorder, which can result in terrifying, violent outbursts.

“The episode [was] so frightening that Don and Suzanne made the girls go to their rooms and lock their doors. Finally things got so bad that Don called the police.” …

By Anne Dachel

Thanks to my friend Wayne Rohde, I now have a site where all the stories I’ve collected on the decline of kids' ability to learn and their behavior over the last year and a half are filed, totaling almost 2,500. I call it Loss of Brain Trust: Childhood Lost,  because kids today bear no resemblance to young people from past generations.

We're all numb to the fact that the media consistently throws out shocking statistics without even a hint of alarm or even concern:

“Northern Ireland is experiencing an ‘autism wave’ with one in 34 school-age children being diagnosed with the condition - and an expert says that services are now ‘at breaking point.’”

“24 percent of students on Staten Island are special needs.”

"One out of every 34 children in New Jersey [one out of every 22 boys] is affected by autism, according to a new report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).”

“Raleigh [NC] schools also dealt with a 75 percent increase in student chronic health conditions such as asthma, diabetes and food allergies from 2002-2015.”

“It's a sad fact that one in seven children have asthma in New Zealand and therefore we are really focussing on helping to support and educate children in school.”

By Anne Dachel

The phony science never ends.  

I just finished a piece about a new study blaming social media for kids with falling IQ scores all over the world. CNN covered it.

It seems that when anyone in the scientific/medical community uses the term environmental cause today, it really something social, not some toxic exposure like cigarettes causing lung cancer.

The IQ findings go hand-in-hand with another official explanation for all the kids with chronic illnesses, behavioral/mental health problems, learning problems. There the blame is place on adverse childhood experiences, otherwise known as toxic stress/childhood trauma. It’s all the bad stuff happening to kids at home.

In case anyone is still looking for answers, here’s the newest “environmental” reason for kids today being so different from children in the past: it is the “overcontrolling parent” at fault for all those with emotional problems.  Not only that, but these ‘helicopter’ parenting “seems to be increasingly prevalent.”

June 18, 2018, WebMD: How 'helicopter' Parenting Impedes a Child's Development

Overcontrolling moms and dads -- so-called "helicopter" parents -- can stunt their children's emotional development, new research warns.

Directing every move a toddler makes may undermine a child's ability to manage their emotions and behavior on their own, explained Nicole Perry, lead author of a new study.

"We found that overcontrolling parenting at age 2 was associated with poorer emotional and behavioral regulation at age 5," said Perry, a postdoctoral fellow with the University of Minnesota Institute of Child Development.

At age 10, this parenting approach also was tied to more child-reported emotional and school problems, fewer teacher-reported social skills, and less teacher-reported academic productivity, she added.

Our Anne Dachel is creating a compendium of the changes in schools around the world as children grow sicker and less able to learn in traditional settings. Special education is exploding, school budgets crumbling and teachers and students alike are suffering. How long can this go on before we see actual collapses in programs? Or before parents of typical kid (both of them, ha ha) tell the special education programs to stuff it? Below are 15 stories from just last week. I especially like that one with the headline that an Ohio Autism School CELEBRATES its 20th year. Yes! Celebrate!! You'll be here foreverrrrrrr!!!!!!!  K

June 1, 2018, UK (N.I.) Derry Journal: Almost 600 waiting for Autism assessment

Almost 600 children and adults are waiting to be assessed for Autism locally, with health officials warning resources cannot meet the soaring demand. …

 The Western Trust has confirmed that the numbers referred for assessment and intervention has risen dramatically. And this has now prompted Trust representatives to relay concerns to both the Health and Social Care Board and Department of Health.

At present there are 493 children and 81 adults across Derry, Limavady, Strabane and the wider western region, waiting to begin assessment to detect if they are on the Autism spectrum.

A further 394 children and 55 adults are currently undergoing the assessment process within the Trust.

The figures were obtained by the ‘Journal’ after a recent report revealed that the number of school age children - 993 - who have come through the assessment process and been diagnosed with Autism and Asperger Syndrome in the west, has increased by almost 50 per cent over the last five years, despite intake numbers remaining static.

Commenting on the waiting lists, a spokesperson for the Western Trust said: “The demand for Autism assessment and intervention for both children and adults within the Western Trust has increased significantly and this trend continues.

Current resource does not meet the level of demand within the Trust and this has been highlighted to the HSCB and DoH.”

 The recent Department of Health report entitled, ‘The Prevalence of Autism (including Asperger Syndrome) in School Age Children’ - found that the increase in children identified with Autism was 31 per cent higher in the most deprived areas of Northern Ireland - several of which are in Derry.  …

***June 1, 2018, UK GetWestLondon: Parents endure up to five year wait for autism diagnosis nationwide according to Hillingdon Manor School founder

Parents are complaining of waiting as long as five years for an autism diagnosis for their child, and are grappling with a "postcode lottery", according to the advocate mum behind Hillingdon Manor School .

The concerns were revived after Westminster's local authorities published its waiting lists on May 24, finding families in the central London borough were waiting as long as a year for diagnosis, despite waiting time guidelines of three months.

A North West London Collaboration of Clinical Commission (NWLCCC) Groups spokeswoman said while the waiting times were "longer than we would like," it was lower than the average national waiting time average estimated by a parent-reported survey at 3.6 years. …

By Anne Dachel

On May 15, 2018, Northern Ireland’s Derry Journal ran the story, Autism diagnosis rise among local schoolkids

The numbers were shocking and so was the attitude of the reporter. While the school population hasn’t increased, the autism numbers continue to soar.

The number of school age children diagnosed with Autism and Asperger Syndrome in the Western Trust area has increased by almost 50 per cent over the last five years.

It has now emerged that around two in every 100 local children are on the Autism spectrum.

The figures are contained new Department of Health report entitled, ‘The Prevalence of Autism (including Asperger Syndrome) in School Age Children’, and do not include the number of children currently being assessed. …

Incredibly, more and more disabled children are not a cause for alarm. The jump in the rate was attributed to “increased awareness,” according to the Dept. of Health which provided the numbers.

The introduction of the Autism Act (NI) 2011 and increased awareness may well have led to a rise the number of assessments and positive diagnoses, its authors state.

The only action called for was more services.

They also add that the “need to develop and improve health and social care services for people of all ages who are affected by autism (including Asperger Syndrome) has been apparent for some time.”

NEW REPORT: THINGS ARE WORSE IN NORTHERN IRELAND

May 18, 2018, Belfast Telegraph: 70% rise in autism among school-age children putting services at 'breaking point'

Northern Ireland is experiencing an "autism wave" with one in 34 school-age children being diagnosed with the condition - and an expert says that services are now "at breaking point".

Research by the Department of Health shows that 8,442 school-age children were diagnosed with autism in 2017/18, with the prevalence of the condition increasing by 69% over the past five years.

In total, 2.9% of schoolchildren here have autism, with children living in urban areas 1.5 times more likely to have the developmental disability.

The Belfast Trust has the highest diagnosis of autism and the autism rate in Northern Ireland's most deprived group was 31% higher than the countrywide average.

Autism NI CEO Kerry Boyd said that a report commissioned by the Department of Education had warned of an "autism wave" in 2002.

She said: "The pressure on autism services is now at breaking point.

"In some trust areas, parents are still waiting up to two years on an assessment and support services are few and far between.

"Therefore, it is often left to the voluntary sector to fill this void, but due to the level of demand on Autism NI's services, we are already stretched to full capacity.…

A Department of Health spokeswoman said that they were continuing to see an increase in demand for autism services….

A spokesperson for the Education Authority (EA) said it continued to invest in its Autism Advisory and Intervention Service.

"Whilst it has seen a rise in the number of children being diagnosed with autism in some areas, EA continues to provide advice and support to schools and parents alongside a training programme.

"Pupil interventions and early intervention remain a key aspect of the work of the regional team."

No number seems too horrific for experts anywhere. Better diagnosing is still the official mantra used to dissuade people from thinking that something is really wrong with kids today.

The really scary thing here is that the rate of one in 34 in Northern Ireland is the exact same rate that researchers recently found in New Jersey.

What if this is now the real rate? What if Belfast and New Jersey are doing the best job of better diagnosing?

Shouldn't health officials and lawmakers want to address this before things reach the point of no return?

Add to the autism rate, the oft-repeated finding that one in 5 children today is mentally ill,   and you have a lot of reasons to worry if we have any future at all.

Footnote:

In a May 17th story in Northern Ireland Newry, readers learned that "currently 24% of enrolled learners" at a local high school are considered special education students.

Anne Dachel is Media Editor of Age of Autism.

By Anne Dachel

On May 17, CBS5 in Scottsdale, AZ aired the story, Family of autistic student alleges assault, cover-up during use of restraints at school 

For parents of children disabled with autism, there are lots of worries, especially when they go off to school. (I say this as the mom of a 31 year old son who spent a lot of 3^rd grade sitting UNDER his desk.)

Behavior that stems from anxiety and fear can have serious results in school, as this CBS5 story shows.

Sean McCarthy is NON-VERBAL (like an estimated 25% of the autism community), and his family noticed a change in his behavior. They linked it to what was happening to him at school in Scottsdale, and it resulted in a lawsuit.

“In newly filed state and federal lawsuits, the McCarthys allege untrained school staff repeatedly restrained their son - physically grabbed and held him - without informing the family as required by a 2015 law.

“The lawsuits also claim district administrators failed to turn over key records and school employees took steps to cover up their actions.”

This went on for two years:

Sean’s parents claim that what happened to their son was assault.

“The family’s federal lawsuit, which was filed this month, claims the restraints were unlawful and amounted to assaults. The lawsuit seeks punitive damages.

“Scottsdale Unified declined to comment on the case because it involves pending litigation, but in court documents, the district denied the family’s allegations and maintained the restraints were legal. The district said the restraints were used to protect students or staff from Sean ‘biting, hitting, kicking, flailing and punching.’

Schools in Arizona have had the legal right to use restraint and seclusion since 2015— when ‘behavior presents an imminent danger of bodily harm to [themselves] or others.’

By Anne Dachel

Last week the World Mercury Project reported on the special education epidemic happening around the world in Part 4 of their series.

https://worldmercuryproject.org/.../part-4-the-special-ed-epidemic-uncovering-the-ans...

“In this four-part series, World Mercury Project's partner, Focus for Health (FFH), examined the special education epidemic, its crippling effects ...”

The WMP’s evidence that increasingly students in our schools today can’t learn or behave as children always have should be cause for follow-up by the national press, one would think, but sadly it’s probably not going to happen. In fact, they’ll do just the opposite.

Sunday, May 13^th the Washington Post addressed this critical topic. The headline said it all: Veteran policymaker says 80 percent of special-ed kids don’t need that label

The Post, like every other mainstream news source out there, has never addressed the explosion in special needs students as a crisis. The truth is, it’s been completely ignored. Staten Island may have 24 percent of its students in special education, 22 percent in Racine, WI, 20 percent in Wahkiakum, WA, but still, it’s no cause for concern.

However, when an impressive group like the World Mercury Project, led by well-known environmentalist Robert Kennedy, Jr., calls what’s happening in special ed an epidemic, it’s  definitely going to draw more attention to the topic. The public might ask where the big name sources in print and broadcast news have been. Why have they said absolutely nothing about this?

The truth is, just like with the horrific increases in autism over the last two decades, the job of the media seems to be to first ignore the situation, and when finally forced to talk about it, deny anything is wrong.

This is exactly what the Post did in their story. The author of the piece, Jay Mathews, is the education columnist for the Post where he’s been working for nearly 50 years. Mathews interviewed Kalman R. “Buzzy” Hettleman who served two terms on the Baltimore school board and was deputy mayor of Baltimore and Maryland secretary of human resources. Surely these two people should be able to tell us what’s going on.

By Anne Dachel

A story from New Jersey this week is proof, once again, that experts who actually admit something is wrong—that the unending autism rate increase might be a real increase, will never demand we stop it from getting worse.

Tracy Kettering PhD BCBA-D wrote the piece in the New Jersey Courier Post on May 9^th entitled, New autism rates surprising? Not to us.  

The numbers don't surprise her

Kettering has a doctoral degree in special education and behavior analysis from Ohio State University, and she is the Director of the Applied Behavior Analysis Center of Excellence at Bancroft. She’s an expert on autism and she's not bothered by yet another increase in the autism rate nationally or at home in New Jersey, where it's now ONE IN EVERY 34 CHILDREN, ONE IN EVERY 22 BOYS.

While Kettering did attribute the new rate to “diagnostic improvements,” she hinted that there might be something else going on.

“And let’s be honest: With all the remarkable research being conducted throughout the country, we still don’t know what causes autism, and it’s possible there also could be a true increase in prevalence of autism – not just better diagnostics.”

Kettering talked at length about the need to provide services and early diagnosing.  Other states have to “be prepared for these increases”…because things are only going to get worse.

 “What we do know is that autism cases continue to grow – and have continued that upward trend for decades. “

“It also means demand will be greater than ever for well-trained, highly educated, caring clinical staff, special educators and direct-support staff who provide the critical day-to-day support to support the children and adults served.”

My questions for all the experts like Kettering who acknowledge that THE INCREASE MIGHT BE REAL are these: When will the numbers be alarming? How bad do things have to get?

Although Kettering sounded satisfied that experts are hard at work on autism, I have to ask, what has the “remarkable research” on autism actually gained for us? ASD is still a complete mystery to every health official at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In fact, no one at the CDC would ever concur with her that “there could be a true increase.” Each and every new rate announcement, including the latest one, has come with the caveat that there is no evidence that more children actually have autism. The new numbers were attributed to an increase in recognizing autism in black and Hispanic children.

My final question for Kettering is specifically this: What will you be saying when the rate in New Jersey is one in every 10 children? No one is saying that it's not coming. 

Anne Dachel is Media Editor for Age of Autism.

SPECIAL ED PERCENTAGE

National official average is 13 percent.

Hazelton, PA: 15 percent of students are sped.

Sioux Falls, SD: 15 percent of students are sped.

Worthington, MN: 15 percent of the students are sped.

By Anne Dachel

Mark [Blaxill] stated ‘You can’t make America great with all these sick children and more coming’. Trump shook his head and agreed.”

Andrew Wakefield: [Talking about his conversation with Donald Trump] "We went on to discuss the issue of the autism crisis in this country which is set to affect one in two children by 2032 according to the CDC's own data if nothing is done, if nothing changes. That's 80 percent of the boys in this country. There is a national crisis.”

Andrew Buncombe reports for the British newspaper, The Independent, and he is out to discredit Andrew Wakefield because Wakefield has refused to back down from his claim of a link between the MMR vaccine and autism and bowel disease in children.

Buncombe isn’t interested in Wakefield’s research. I’m sure he’s never bothered to read Callous Disregard,   the book in which Wakefield explained how he became involved in the most heated issue in pediatric medicine and what he learned about the MMR vaccine.

Buncombe’s real interest is discrediting ANYONE who dares to question the ever-expanding, unchecked vaccine schedule. He couldn’t care less about what autism is doing to millions of children around the world, in fact, autism is barely mentioned in his reporting. 

(On a personal note, having spent a summer in the hospital in Rugby, England after a car accident, I am aware that a surgeon in Britain is addressed as “Mr.” Dr. Wakefield in these stories is referred to as “Mr. Wakefield,” but I suspect that it’s done more to discredit him than to acknowledge his prominence as a surgeon in gastroenterology. No one in the media is interested in his findings as a GI doctor.)

Here are some of Buncombe’s latest reports. Judge for yourself what his real agenda is.

May 6, 2018, UK Independent: How a Muslim community overcame disinformation linking vaccines to autism

…When health officials in Minnesota were confronted by the biggest outbreak of measles in decades, they knew that earning the community’s trust would be crucial.

The section of the community most affected by the outbreak that eventually infected 79 people, the same as for the whole of the US in any average year, were Somali Americans. The vast majority were children under 10 who had not been vaccinated.

The state’s Somali Americans used to vaccinate their children more than other Minnesotans, but the rate fell, between 2004 and 2014, from 92 per cent to 40 per cent. Officials have linked this to visits paid to the community by anti-vaccine activist Andrew Wakefield and other campaigners, whose influence still reverberates.….

“I think that before Andrew visited the Two Cities, Somali parents vaccinated their kids at around 90 per cent. But right now it’s 40, and that shows the fear’s impact and because of that you see a measles outbreak in the state of Minnesota.”

May 5, 2018, UK Independent: Trump claims vaccines and autism are linked but his own experts vehemently disagree

By Anne Dachel

One of my favorite quotes about the media is this one from the movie, Argo: “If you want to sell a lie, get the press to sell it for you.”

This is exactly what’s happened.

There have been decades of decline in the health of children—developmentally, behaviorally, physically—and the press has reported on it all. It’s been endless, even tedious. We’ve been fed a steady diet of autism increases that should have stopped us all dead in our tracks, but officials have never been sure if higher rates mean more kids have autism. Autism has merely been a “concern” to the guardians of our health at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.  There is no need for worry, and that’s how the press spins it.

But it’s clearly more than just autism happening to more and more kids. Mental health is now a major focus of schools everywhere. Social—emotional learning is right up there with math and reading. Keeping kids calm is as important as final exams. The special needs student today is more likely to have behavioral problems than just learning difficulties.

Add to that the stunning numbers of kids with chronic health problems that schools are forced to deal with--asthma, allergies, seizures, diabetes, bowel disease. In-school clinics are becoming standard in lots of places because the need is there.

So why is this happening? Why are children today so unwell? No one is really sure, and no one really wants to find out. Awareness, acceptance, and accommodation are the only things we really care about. I know this for a fact because I’ve been following these stories specifically for a year and half and NO ONE EVER DEMANDS THAT WE FIND OUT WHAT’S GOING ON.

NOTE: Maybe Bruce Springsteen will write a song about the boys with autism who can't find work in the closed factories... and who might never have their hearts broken by a Jersey girl. Born in the USA has become frightening as more families are learning their child has a diagnosis. We are in an emergency situation.

U.S. autism rate now one in every 59 eight year olds in America. In New Jersey, it's one in every 34 children, one in every 22 boys.

By Anne Dachel

The numbers are from 2014. Dare we suspect that they are even worse today? Is anyone alarmed because the New Jersey rate is so much higher than the national average?  What if the Garden State has the most accurate count of kids? 

The go-to guy on autism in New Jersey is Dr. Walter Zahorodny. His remarks in the press on the horrific rate in New Jersey are incomprehensible. 

Six years ago he admitted the possibility of a connection between vaccines and autism.

I wrote this for Age of Autism:

Walter Zahorodny, an associate professor at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School, directed the autism study. (Photo: Photo courtesy of Nick Romanenko)

Finally, there's Dr. Walter Zahorodny, an assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey in Newark and he was the lead researcher on the New Jersey portion of a CDC rate study.  He was interviewed for Philly.com in March, 2014 about the update in the autism rate to one in every 68 children.  Zahorodny said, 'It's a true increase. It's a change of great magnitude. It's silly to go on debating that.'  Furthermore, he said the numbers are going to get even worse.

Back in April, 2012, Zahorodny was featured on the Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC radio.

During the interview, the host brought up research on the possible causes for autism and he made this comment: "I guess we know what they aren't, for instance, childhood vaccines, right?”

This was Zahorodny's stunning response: "Vaccines don't play a significant role in autism increasing. Some small number of children probably do have autism because of an adverse vaccine reaction, but they don't make for the overall rise. Similarly, thimerosal, the additive in vaccines which was almost entirely out of the picture by 2000, which was when our children in the '08 study were born. So these kids, which would have seen declining autism prevalence if thimerosal was an important risk factor, not increasing prevalence. So I rule those two things out. There are other factors that would be more likely at play-demographical factors related to parents' age and other factors linked to that."

So a "small number of children" have autism because of their vaccines.  Shouldn't we all be concerned? 

While Zahorondny's claim that thimerosal was removed by 2000 is clearly wrong, his admission that yes, some kids really do become autistic after vaccinations, was alarming.

So how much of the rate increase is because of the vaccines children receive?

So now it’s 2018 and the numbers have once again taken a jump leap forward.

 Since NJ has the highest rate in the country, Zahorodny is being quoted in national coverage. He makes it clear that it isn’t just BETTER DIAGNOSING. The numbers show no sign of slowing down. He finds that worrisome...

By Anne Dachel

How fitting that the people who run the ever-expanding vaccine schedule (the one rife with charges of fraud, collusion and cover-up) also get to keep track of the autism numbers.

The rate is up again, but there’s no need to worry. It’s just more of the “better diagnosing” that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has been famous for, for the last twenty years.

Notice the piece below by Ari Ne’eman in which he is adamant: THERE IS NO EPIDEMIC. It’s all just better recognition of a disorder that’s always affected a significant number of people.

The only malfeasance here is society’s failure to something about all the autism plaguing adults. We’ve ignored them for far too long. It’s time to right that wrong and find the undiagnosed/misdiagnosed in the adult population, according to Ne’eman.

Good luck with that. They tried it in Britain in 2011. Using survey questions, researchers surmised that autism affects adults at the same rate as children. Finding middle aged adults who would rather stay home and read a book than go to a party was supposed to be equivalent to masses of hand—flapping, head—banging, non—verbal six-year-olds.

April 28, 2018, Vox: The CDC just announced 1 in 59 children are autistic. Here’s why that’s not evidence of an epidemic. By Ari Ne'eman

Especially within minority groups, parents and doctors are getting better at identifying the condition.

The Centers for Disease Control this week released the latest autism prevalence numbers, which suggest that approximately 1 in 59 children are autistic. …

There is no autism epidemic, however. The numbers are likely changing due to improved diagnosis and services, more inclusive diagnostic criteria and reduced stigma rather than a change in the actual number of autistic people. …

By Anne Dachel

Here is yet another look at the fall of education in America (and everywhere else in the English speaking world).

Months and months of stories have shown what should be obvious to all: our schools are noticeably different from what they were fifteen and twenty years ago, and certainly a world away from schools thirty and forty years ago.

What is undeniable is the fact that schools have to provide for more and more students who can’t learn or behave normally, and the demands for accommodations keep increasing.

So why isn’t this a critical issue?

How can “experts” make absurd claims that dismiss what’s happening and they’re never challenged?

Why is the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention allowed to produce the science that supposedly shows the explosion in social/emotional/behavioral problems is due to an increased number of parents abusing their own children and inflicting “adverse childhood experiences” on them?

Why are we just supposed to accept the claim that one in every five children now has a mental illness?

Why has there been a coincidental increase in students with a whole host of chronic health conditions?

Why doesn’t Education Secretary Betsy DeVos say anything about the increase in special education students, the millions being spent to address mental health issues in school districts, and why teachers still have to be trained to teach kids with challenging behavior?

Since January 2017 I’ve been gathering stories about kids in schools. Here is what I’ve put out on Age of Autism. They’re just a sample from a whole lot more, well over 3,000 in my files. Stories are never about declining numbers or situations getting better. I can’t imagine what I’ll find a year from now.
 

April 18, 2018, Tell a lie enough times, and it becomes the truth…ESPECIALLY IF PEOPLE WANT TO BELIEVE IT! http://www.ageofautism.com/2018/04/tell-a-lie-enough-times-and-it-becomes-the-truthespecially-if-people-want-to-believe-it.html

April 12, 2018, Nothing To See Here http://www.ageofautism.com/2018/04/nothing-to-see-here.html

March 27, 2018, ABCs Are Becoming IEPs in Education as Mental Health Issues Beset Districts http://www.ageofautism.com/2018/03/abcs-are-becoming-ieps-in-education-as-mental-health-issues-beset-districts.html

March 22, 2018, Schools Becoming the New Mental Health Institutions  http://www.ageofautism.com/2018/03/schools-becoming-the-new-mental-health-institutions.html

By Anne Dachel

During the last decades ago, as autism became an ever—increasing diagnosis, taking giant steps in the rate every two years or so, people wanted to know where it was coming from. Experts didn’t have a clue, but they did have guesses and lots of dead—end studies to support them. The two most often cited were BETTER DIAGNOSING, and GENETICS, although either one made any sense.

First of all, IF all the children with autism were nothing new, then we should have been able to find comparable rates among all ages of adults, and no one has ever done that.

Second, a dramatic change in genetics in a generation or two is simply impossible.

Never mind. The only task for the medical community and health officials was to pretend NOTHING WAS WRONG. The fact that 30 percent of parents reported that their child was normal and then dramatically lost learned skills and regressed into autism was never a concern.

To further muddy the waters, lots of time, money and expertise was spent making meaningless associations between autism and bad parents—especially BAD MOMS (very similar to the old “refrigerator mom” theory): old moms, moms who marry old dads, fat moms, drinking moms, moms on anti-depressants, smoking moms, moms who have babies too close together, moms who have preemies, pregnant moms who don’t get enough vitamin D, and moms who live too close to freeways.

MOST OF ALL, experts were out to kill the claim that vaccines were the cause. Endless dollars went into disproving any link between our ever—expanding vaccine schedule and the development of autism.

And it worked. Today, if a child loses the ability to talk or interact after previously meeting every milestone, resulting in an autism diagnosing—it’s just what happens. It’s all so confusing. It’s why we use a puzzle piece. Autism will remain a mystery.

Simple truth: No official knows anything for sure about autism. We don’t even have new official rate. AND NO MATTER WHAT THE RATE, no one in charge will ever admit that an increase means that more kids have autism.

SO is it one in 36 CHILDREN? http://www.ageofautism.com/2017/12/autism-1-in-36-asd-rate-set-a-new-record-high-in-2016.html

Or is it one in 68 CHILDREN, as unconcerned reporters blithely tell us every day?

Or is it one in 45 CHILDREN, as we were told by officials in 2014?

Or is it one in 38 CHILDREN, as Autism Speaks found in their Korean study in 2011?

IT DOESN’T MATTER. Numbers will NEVER MATTER when it comes to autism. There will ALWAYS be some explanation. There has to be because IF all the kids with autism are a new phenomenon, then we would have to do something. We would have move mountains to STOP IT. No one in authority wants to look at autism like this, so we do nothing.

NOW THE NEWEST EPIDEMIC

By Anne Dachel

Numbers mean nothing. Cost is meaningless. NO MATTER HOW BAD THINGS GET IN SCHOOLS, THERE WILL NEVER BE A REAL PROBLEM. Behavior is out-of-control. Special education is exploding at the seams. Mental health concerns are a more critical topic than academics in our schools. STILL, everything is fine. Experts are working on it. We’ll survive this.

Here are around 70 stories from the last two weeks. They’re from all over—the U.S., Canada, and Britain. They’re about schools adding sensory rooms so kids can calm down and make it through the school day, about more and more schools spending vast sums on mental health services, about schools in Britain so overwhelmed that there aren’t enough places for all the disabled students, and about increasing incidents of out-of-control kids in the elementary schools attacking teachers.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has their own study from 1998 to show that the changes in kids’ health and behavior are the result of bad parents who expose them to trauma at home. This is what teachers are being taught everywhere. I’m sure it will work. The press is already reporting on it as dogma. Schools need to take over and counter what parents are doing. Teachers have learned to ask, “What happened to this student” and not, “Why did the student do this?” Every mom and dad whose child has behavior issues should hang their heads in shame.

March 25, 2018, (UK) Maidenhead Advertiser: New Dorney school creates safe learning space for children in care

… The head of a new school for young people in care says it aims to put each child at the centre of everything it does.

Stephen Rodgers is head of education at the Eton Dorney Residential School, which has room to house six young people and 18 day spaces for 10 to 18-year-olds. …

Inside, Natalie showed off the sensory room, which is used if a child is anxious and is a place to reassure them.

“These children can be in the care system for a number of reasons including learning and behavioural difficulties,” said Natalie. “ …

By Anne Dachel

Over the last 15 months I’ve collected around 4,000 stories on the decline of children’s health and behavior and what it’s doing to schools around the world. The February 14^th shooting in Parkland, Florida is just one factor forcing educators to address mental/behavioral health problems. State legislatures are okaying millions of dollars to address mental health in schools, and districts are adding more experts to help with the social/emotional needs of students.

Educators are struggling and they’re scared of a student population unlike any they’ve had in the past.

Incredibly we’re not seeing any panic over what’s happening. In fact, our Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has assured us that THEY KNOW WHY childhood is dramatically different: bad parents are raising children in abusive homes. There is a massive effort to educate teachers about what Adverse Childhood Experiences are doing.  Below is just a sample of what’s out there.

When children can’t learn, pay attention, or behave in school, teachers are told, “Instead of saying what's wrong with you, why can't you just sit still and pay attention? We say: what happened to you?”  

Parents now have a lot to answer for.

Mar 18, 2018, Wakefield, RI, Narragansett Times: Town council, school committee negotiate budget

… Among those identified needs that would be included in a budget with a 2.93 percent PTT are the addition of a family community engagement (FCE) teacher, a SKHS career pathway/ internship teacher, a social emotional learning (SEL) teacher and a teacher assistant (TA) with a chauffeur license who could help transport families to IEP and 504 meetings.

School committee member Kate Macinanti pointed out that each of those positions would benefit students’ mental health.