There's not enough money to help you

There's not enough money to help you with your Autism?

What are your thoughts?

Autism - Cuts

Basically an article that highlights the consequences of neglecting people in need of support on the spectrum. It highlights 2 cases - one of rape and murder and another of malnutrition expierenced by ASDers where support had been denied or lost. The author spends most of the article talking about her brother - services suggested he be moved to "a care home in the deepest rural wales 100s miles away from mum and I" she does not sound impressed - she ends the article generally questioning both 'Big Society' and the removal of the current eligebility criteria. While there's not much talk of funding the Big Society harkens back to the help yourself attitude of the budget cuts.

Parents
  • I'm worried by these statistics - definitely too much spin here. Remember this is being led by an economist in the UK publishing in an American journal (comparing UK and US figures - but why otherwise publish in the US?).

    The main argument is about the proportion of money spent on research compared to that on care, £180 on research for every £1m spent on care. £4m a year is spent on autism research in the UK compared to £590m on cancer research, and £169m on heart disease.

    However 42% of the £29bn cost of autism quoted is lost earnings due to not being employed. Only 2% of that £29bn is spent on providing carers, and the remaining 56% is on "services". Some of us might wonder what are these services........

    The costs were arrived at by "reviewing existing literature" .... that is to say a lot of reading books and doing sums that may be a long way adrift of real figures.

    The argument of the research is to spend less on care and more on research to find a cure or "address the underlying behaviours" - sorting us out so we don't cost so much to care for.

    There's nothing about more money on research to improve lives and help us help ourselves.

    Too much of it, I suspect, is about academics looking to get more money to spend doing research of dubious benefit to people with autism,but that keeps academic research departments open and well staffed.

Reply
  • I'm worried by these statistics - definitely too much spin here. Remember this is being led by an economist in the UK publishing in an American journal (comparing UK and US figures - but why otherwise publish in the US?).

    The main argument is about the proportion of money spent on research compared to that on care, £180 on research for every £1m spent on care. £4m a year is spent on autism research in the UK compared to £590m on cancer research, and £169m on heart disease.

    However 42% of the £29bn cost of autism quoted is lost earnings due to not being employed. Only 2% of that £29bn is spent on providing carers, and the remaining 56% is on "services". Some of us might wonder what are these services........

    The costs were arrived at by "reviewing existing literature" .... that is to say a lot of reading books and doing sums that may be a long way adrift of real figures.

    The argument of the research is to spend less on care and more on research to find a cure or "address the underlying behaviours" - sorting us out so we don't cost so much to care for.

    There's nothing about more money on research to improve lives and help us help ourselves.

    Too much of it, I suspect, is about academics looking to get more money to spend doing research of dubious benefit to people with autism,but that keeps academic research departments open and well staffed.

Children
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