Environmental toxins escalate autism incidence rates!

Recently, researchers have found that rates of autism and intellectually disability can be correlated with incidence of genital malformation in newborn males- an indicator of fetus exposure to harmful environmental factors, such as pesticides.

As an indicator of parental exposure to environmental toxins, the research team form University of Chicago looked at the levels of congenital malformations of the reproductive system in males. They note that male fetuses are very sensitive to certain environmental toxins, and such exposure is believed to lead to reproductive malformations existing at birth, including micropenis and undescended testicles.

On assessing the incidence rates of autism and intellectual disability (ID), the team found that every 1% increase in malformations was linked to a 283% increase in autism and a 94% increase in ID. They also found that higher autism rates had higher ID rates. The researchers say this supports the presence of harmful environmental factors.

Furthermore, the researchers discovered that male children with autism were almost six times more likely to have genital malformations at birth.