To just remind you that autism is genetic?

[robotgun]

Research tells us that 60 to 90% of the risk for autism comes from your genome. Maternal and paternal age are also a significant factor. Also genetic variants exist that cause autism-like behaviours and go undiagnosed because we don't routinely run genetic tests on our children. We also don't routinely institutionalise children that are different to their peers.

There's 'more' autism because people are having babies at older ages. And we are better at spotting autism.

It isn't heavy metals, microplastics, or the MMR.

Sorry, but it seems like every day I open this app and there's a new post saying 'What's going on with all this autism around, eh?' and a slew of replies blaming environmental factors that have no science behind them whatsoever. Or, worse, blaming mothers for reproducing too late in life or eating tuna in pregnancy or taking prescribed meds.

If you see enough of these threads every day you could well start to believe the nonsense that people write, much like people that read the Daily Mail every day start to believe that Meghan Markle is the devil.

Autism has always been here. It's not better or worse than it used to be.

Can I just say that this is a link to a medical magazine and the actual report ends
Researchers still need further evidence to determine the link between Parkinson’s and ADHD, as well as the long-term effects of ADHD medications.
So the jury is still out on this. More research is needed.

I did say that here’s a couple of papers:

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0963689720947416

https://rxisk.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/Baumeister-Is_Attention_Deficit_Hyperactivity_Disorder_a_Risk.4-2-1.pdf

If you think about it (and I'm saying this as somebody who studied genetics from a mathematical perspective at university many years ago, not a biologist), it totally makes sense. Mutations (DNA copying errors) occur at cell division time - and, when there are many orders of magnitude fewer cells, there's more of a chance that those mutations will become the dominant majority. Therefore, the earlier the mutation, the more likely it is that those cells will go on to heavily influence further cell divisions.

Therefore, it's vastly more likely to happen in the womb than at any other time, except maybe the creation of the sperm (given the much higher number compared with the number of eggs a woman carries).

EDIT: More than happy to be corrected by any biologists in the crowd...

I know: I was just trying to grab OP's attention!

I wouldn't necessarily draw that conclusion. I think it's more likely that these conditions are genetically linked in some way. I believe there's research being done currently. There is a definite link with ADHD and Ehlers Danlos though, I know I've read that.

Is your sibling your identical twin? As that’s what the post was referring to…

Autism has a heritability of 90% which means it is genetic in origin.

Autism & ADHD “run” in families.

If you believe otherwise, please do some research.

it means it has a substantial genetic component but to save me typing out an explanation of heritability this is pretty good:

www.thetransmitter.org/spectrum/autism-heritability-it-probably-does-not-mean-what-you-think-it-means/

Genetic doesn't always mean.its inherited from parents, my son has a,rare chromosome disorder, thought t9 be the underlying cause of his autism and learning disabilities, but it was de novo and neither me or his Dad are autistic.

I know identical twin girls ,whilst both have a diagnosis of autism, one is far more impacted then the other ,she's non verbal and at a special for children with severe and profound learning disabilities, whilst her.twin is very verbal and attends mainstream albeit with an EHCP etc.

What drug?