Researchers find clues to Autism in our genes and our gut

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Link: http://www.theprovince.com/health/Researchers+find+clues+autism+genes/9586070/story.html

There's a 6min TEDxCaltech video w/ the article, too - give it a watch/listen and the article a read.

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No for supporting trump. Because doing so is deplorable.

Be careful it is not another false lead like the work of wakefield, he claimed all manner of things about MMR jabs and autism and guts.

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Health is a state of physical, mental and social wellbeing and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity I am not a jigsaw, I am a free man !

Diagnosed under the DSM5 rules with autism spectrum disorder, under DSM4 psychologist said would have been AS (299.80) but I suspect that I am somewhere between 299.80 and 299.00 (Autism) under DSM4.

Why do I get the feeling this is going to be one of those 'autism isn't to do with neurology, its all in your gut, just need to change your diet and it will go away' type theories?

ah, perhaps because it is:

"In a paper published recently in Cell, Hsiao and other researchers describe how they caused autism-like symptoms in mice by injecting them with a virus-like molecule. Then, with the use of probiotics containing Bacteroides Fragilis, they were able to repair the barrier function of the gut, and also reduce the behavioural symptoms."

So knowingly injecting mice with a virus like molecule that causes autism like symptoms means autism is caused by a virus and can be fixed by pro-biotics? What evidence to they have to suggest this virus like injection actually mimics what happens to create autistic people. All this shows is maybe some viruses could cause autism like symptoms that could be treated by treating the virus or whatever....but I'd question if those would be examples of real autism.

I mean people can get delusional and hallucinate if they have a fever.....doesn't mean fever=schizophrenia.

Okay, there's the father who writes about regularly giving his autistic teenage son, now a young man, whipworm eggs specific to pig. Yuck factor . . . but the father says it seems to work. I'd like to know what this son thinks.

The hypothesis that some cases of autism are caused by inflammation.

And the second idea of "we miss our worms," or more technically, helminth replacement therapy. In one study of people who suffered from a specific type of irritable bowel syndrome about 40% of the study participants were significantly helped by pig whipworms.

Okay, wow, so the pig whipworm eggs won't last longer than about a month and are unlikely to spread to other people, kind of no harm, no foul. It's a free roll. It is works, great. If it doesn't, well, nothing really lost.

So, for people so inclined, maybe try it ever so casually, without investing a lot of time, money, or hope.

A substantial harm to outlandish medical treatment is false hope. The person is hoping for a miracle cure and not appreciating their autistic child or themselves for the person they are in the here and now. The person is potentially missing things like teaching sign language to their child, and/or typing on a keyboard. More broadly, the person might be missing the whole approach of playing to strength, being matter-of-fact about deficiencies.

Another idea with the gut is that people on the spectrum have trouble with sulfur metabolism anyway and have a gut bacteria that uses up available sulfur reserves by causing the body to defend itself from a chemical used in bacteria-to-bacteria turf battles.
http://www.economist.com/node/21560523 <-- and look about two thirds of the way down

Again, please don't overly invest in any one idea. Or, something might help some people on the spectrum but not others.