The United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released a data analysis on December 3, 2021, suggesting 1 in 44 children are categorized as autistic by age eight in the United States. Is the 2.3 percent rate accurate nationally, using current diagnostic instruments? These data present a curious question: Why…
Tag: statistics
Podcast Episode 0057; Season 04, Episode 21; February 23, 2021 Quoting from the Autistic Self Advocacy Network: Disability Community Day of Mourning In the past five years, over 700 people with disabilities have been murdered by their parents. Every year on March 1, the disability community gathers across the nation to remember…
I’ve written many times that the diagnostic rate for any condition is not the same as the actual prevalence. Examples of sudden “explosions” in diagnoses, abound, from various cancers to mental health conditions. In some cases, diagnoses were impossible. In others, conditions were clarified and reclassified by improved science. Anyway……
There are times when nothing makes sense. The universe, despite its patterns, seems random, chaotic, and even cruel. Yet, reality simply is. We can study statistics, predict possible outcomes, develop complex models for nearly every contained system… yet on the personal level those models are useless. We can predict that…
Is autism increasing or are the diagnoses increasing? I presume we’re getting better at diagnosing autism. Autism in California increases twelvefold By Sandy Kleffman Updated: 05/06/2009 08:12:02 PM PDT California saw a twelvefold increase during the past two decades in the number of autistic people who are receiving services through…
Why in the world CNN and many other media outlets decided to give “equal time” to various autism experts like Jenny McCarthy is beyond me. This is like giving equal time to the Flat Earth Society when discussing El Niño and ocean currents. McCarthy, Kirby, and others are using Autism…
November 29, 2007, was a lousy day. I did poorly, very poorly, on an exam in statistics. The damage to self-esteem was fairly deep. I’m not supposed to do poorly on any test, in any class. I’ve seldom done well with written tests — it is painful to write for…