Study Pinpoints Autism Clusters in Calif.

(CBS)  Researchers in California have identified 10 regions in the state where cases of autism are higher than in nearby regions.

The study finds that the areas, called clusters, are in places where parents have above average levels of education, or are also places located near large autism treatment facilities.

The research, conducted by scientists at UC Davis, showed that the clusters appear in highly populated areas of Southern California and the Bay Area.

"This is the first time that anyone has looked at the geography of autism births in California in order to see whether there might be some local patches of elevated environmental risk. This method ignores unknown widespread factors (such as a regional pollutant) that could increase autism incidence," Karla Van Meter, the study's lead author, said.

The study tracked all 2.5 million births in the state from 1996 to 2000 and found roughly 10,000 children were diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder.

The researchers said the clusters probably are not linked to specific environmental pollutants or other. Rather, they correlate to areas where residents are more educated.

"What we found with these clusters was that they correlated with neighborhoods of high education or neighborhoods that were near a major treatment center for autism," senior author Irva Hertz-Picciotto, a professor of public health sciences and a researcher with the UC Davis MIND Institute, said.

"In the U.S., the children of older, white and highly educated parents are more likely to receive a diagnosis of autism or autism spectrum disorder. For this reason, the clusters we found are probably not a result of a common environmental exposure. Instead, the differences in education, age and ethnicity of parents comparing births in the cluster versus those outside the cluster were striking enough to explain the clusters of autism cases," Hertz-Picciotto said.

Click here to read the full press release on the study's findings.

In Southern California, the cluster were located near these autism treatment centers:

1. The Westside Regional Center, in Culver City, Calif., serving the communities of western Los Angeles County, including the cities of Culver City, Inglewood and Santa Monica.

2. The Harbor Regional Center, in Torrance, Calif., sreving southern Los Angeles County, including the cities of Bellflower, Harbor, Long Beach and Torrance.

3. The North Los Angeles County Regional Center, in Van Nuys, Calif., serving the San Fernando and Antelope valleys - two clusters were located in this regional center's service zone.

4. The South Central Los Angeles Regional Center, in Los Angeles, serving the communities of Compton and Gardena.

5. The Regional Center of Orange County, in Santa Ana, Calif., serving the residents of Orange County.

6. The Regional Center of San Diego County, in San Diego, serving people living in Imperial and San Diego counties.

In Northern California, the clusters appeared in the following locations:

7. The Golden Gate Regional Center, in San Francisco, serving Marin and San Mateo counties and the City and County of San Francisco. Two clusters were located within the Golden Gate Regional Center's service zone.

8. The San Andreas Regional Center, in Campbell, Calif., serving Santa Clara, Santa Cruz, Monterey and San Benito counties.

Two areas of increased incidence were located in Central California:

9. The Central Valley Regional Center, in Fresno, Calif., serving Fresno, Kings, Madera, Mariposa, Merced and Tulare counties; and

10. The Valley Mountain Regional Center, in Stockton, Calif., serving Amador, Calaveras, San Joaquin, Stanislaus and Tuolumne counties.

[nicklouis]

Its hard to pinpoint what exactly is the cause for these clusters, there are a lot of different variables that come into play. One thing that clinicians do know and support is ABA therapy. If your child is on the spectrum and you want a great tool to supplement existing ABA, check out rethink autism http://******/6s1G3J I think it can help parents teach their kids a great deal.

[httpwwwnews]

Autism is EVERYWHERE. Lucky upper socio-economic families with insurance can get diagnois and treatment...lower and medical families have a rough time. School districts want to pretend these kids just have a specific learning disability and include them in a regular classroom with some interventions in order to save money. Everyone suffers.

I actually heard a director of special education in a school district say (in December) that a blantantly autistic child (with almost every documented symptom and a previous diagnois from a psychiatrist before coming to that district) wasn't autistic because the child could talk. Is this person on the same planet as the rest of us? Autistic kids can talk. A lot of them echo things over and over. No, it's all about money.

Look at the location of the two areas where it was not shown to be linked to socio-economic and location of treatment centers...in the central valley, where there is heavy use of fertilizers and pesticides. It's well known that asthma is epidemic there.

More study is needed!

[outwestbutnotca]

Well, since we are all being so un-scientific here, let me point out an obvious theory. What if I said that people in the immediate vicinity of hospitals treating TB were exhibiting alarmingly higher rates of TB than those in other areas, what would you conclude? Wouldn?t it be something if the sudden (and tragic) increase in Autism is caused by a yet to be detected agent like HIV? We now have pretty conclusive evidence that fatigue syndrome and a number of gastric problems are being caused by previously unknown infectious agents. Is it outside of the realm of possibility that this condition is being caused by an infectious agent, and that the area immediately surrounding the treatment facilities might just be hyper infected? Just thinking outside the box.

[nonymus]

Strange, I was thinking the exact same thing as I was reading this, what susan said.

[CarlosdelGato]

Autism - what a terrible condition for anyone. I personally believe that it is the result of the chemicals in our major food supplies over the past 50 years. And it affects more males than female due to how these chemicals "change" the DNA structure. And other environmental issues act like a catalyst - maybe that's why this story found clusters.

Chemicals have made a major financial impact on our society but just the positive ones have been focused on and probably the negative side effects were discounted due to the rapid profits that could be realized. Most likely.

[MickeySee]

***? This is getting ridiculous. Beleive me, if I could find a reason why my grandson is autistic, I would. As far as this article goes,.....give me a break!

[SusanStoHelit]

OMG - could it be more clear???

'clusters' of autism near two places - where there is a treatment center (in other words, a bunch of nearby doctors who make money from diagnosing kids with autism), and where there are highly educated parents (more likely to seek a diagnosis if their child is the least behind or not ahead on developmental milestones; and more likely to have the one and ONLY factor found to cause autism to happen more often - parents who are older when they have the child).

Autism is real. But the expansion in numbers, clusters, is not. It's manufactured from people who have reasons to diagnose autism - sometimes good reasons (to get more state funded help for a non-autistic developmentally delayed child), sometimes bad reasons (they make money from treating it). The number of 'formerly autistic' children is proof of this - since you don't recover from autism, all those 'formerly autistic' children are the ones misdiagnosed.