Why Is The Autism Rate Rising So Fast?

[joepole]

>Do you really need to see data that proves women who spend their money
>on vitamins and doctor visits, as opposed to booze and crack, have healthier
>babies before you believe there's a correlation?

"Healthy babies" and "birth defects" (or lack thereof) can be very different things. Aortic valve stenosis is one of many "birth defects" that show up children whose mothers did all the "right" things as often as it shows up in the children of crack whores. Fetal Alcohol Syndrome is an example of a birth defect that does correlate with maternal prenatal activity.

I have no idea what maternal activities correlate with autism, it's not something we ever worried about with our kids because my wife didn't have any vices (smoking, drinking, caffeine, etc.) during either pregnancy. Do you have any evidence to suggest that autism is caused (or contributed to) by maternal prenatal activity? If you do't then it's pretty foolish to make statements like the rise in the autism rate is "due to delinquent behavior resulting in abnormal family units...Teen pregnancy, single mothers, drug abusers..."

If you had to wager whether the typical single mother or pregnant teen of 2007 gets better or worse prenatal care than the typical middle-class housewife of 1940, where would you put your money?