The Autism “Epidemic”: Why MAHAs Witch Hunt for a Cause & “Cure” is a Dangerous Fantasy with Dr. Tommy Martin

Here’s a run down of what we discussed in today’s episode: Introduction Parenting a Child With Autism Through a Doctor’s Lens Why Autism Sparks Fear, Stigma, and Conspiracies What Science Actually Says About Autism Risk Factors Folate, Pregnancy, and the Push for Folinic Acid Tylenol, Fevers, and the Erosion of Medical Trust Vaccine Myths and the Cost of Misinformation The Autism Witch Hunt and Public Health Fears Reassurance for Parents Navigating Autism Anxiety Neurodivergence and Its Superpowers Supporting Brilliant Neurodivergent Minds Check in with today’s amazing guest: Instagram: @dr.tommymartin Tiktok: @dr.tommymartin Youtube: @dr.tommymartin References: Maternal Plasma Folate, Vitamin B12 Levels and Multivitamin Supplement during Pregnancy and Risk of Autism Spectrum Disorders in the Boston Birth Cohort Disclaimer: The content in this episode is for educational and entertainment purposes only and is never a substitute for medical advice. If you’re struggling with with your mental or physical health, please work one on one with a health care provider. If you have heard yourself in our discussion today, and are looking for support, contact the free NEDIC helpline at 1-866-NEDIC-20 or go to eatingdisorderhope.com. • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •✨ Reach Your Weight & Health Goals — Without Dieting! Pre-order The Hunger Crushing Combo Method, Abbey’s revolutionary additive approach to eating well. Learn how to boost satiety, stabilize blood sugars, reduce disease risk, and improve your relationship with food — all while getting the best nutrient bang for your caloric buck. With 400+ research citations, cheat sheets, evidence-based actionable tips, meal plans, and adaptable recipes, The Hunger Crushing Combo Method is the only nutrition bible you’ll ever need. 👉 Pre-order today! 🛒 Where to Purchase: Amazon Barnes & Noble Amazon Kindle Apple Books Google Play Kobo Apple Books (Audiobook) Audible abbeyskitchen.com/hunger-crushing-combo • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •✉️ Subscribe to My Newsletters: Abbey’s Kitchen Newsletter 📘 Check out my FREE E-Books: Hunger Crushing Combo™ E-Book Protein 101 E-Book 👋 Follow me! Instagram: @abbeyskitchen TikTok: @abbeyskitchen YouTube: @AbbeysKitchen Blog: abbeyskitchen.com Book: The Mindful Glow Cookbook • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 🎧 Don’t forget to subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen — and leave us a review! It really helps support the show ❤️ 💬 If you liked this podcast, please like, follow, and leave a review — and let me know who you’d love to hear about next! ⭐ ⭐ ⭐⭐ ⭐ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:30Speaker 01

  You took this and it caused this in your child. And therefore, like, you shouldn't have done that. And I just don't think that's fair. For all the parents out there, if your child has autism, there's nothing that you did that led to that.

• 0:49Abbey Sharp?

  Welcome to another episode of Bite Back with Abbey Sharp, where I dismantle die culture rules, call out the charlatans spitting the pseudoscience, and help you achieve food freedom for good. Today, we're going to be tackling a subject that is often clouded by fear, myths, and finger pointing. Autism in children. And my guest today is no stranger to the quote, "controversy." Dr. Tommy Martin is a science communicator, pediatrician, and father to a son with autism, bringing both professional expertise and personal experience to this very important conversation.

• 1:31Abbey Sharp?

  Together, we will unpack how America is approaching autism right now. The role of misinformation, the scapegoating of vaccines despite very clear and powerful research that they do not cause autism, and the real impact of fear-based narratives on families and children, those who are both neurodivergent and not. Now, a reminder that today's episode will be touching on some more sensitive and unfortunately, politically-adjacent themes. We do our absolute best not to get into politics on this podcast, but to talk about autism in 2025, we... Unfortunately, do need to talk about Maha activities.

• 2:14Abbey Sharp?

  But I just want to reiterate here that this is not meant to demonize or celebrate one political party over the other. I am just trying to stick to the implications for public health, because that is truly all I'm qualified to speak to as a Canadian, never mind a dietitian. And I just hope that it's interpreted as going no further than that. But very quickly, if you are new here, it would mean so much to me if you would please hit that subscribe button wherever you're getting your podcasts. And maybe leave me a little comment if you are loving these episodes. All of your support means so much to me in helping to grow this podcast. All right, friends, let's get to it.

• 3:02Abbey Sharp?

  Hello, Tommy. Thank you so much for joining me.

• 3:05Speaker 01

  Abbey, it is truly an honor and pleasure. I've been following your content for years, so it's so awesome to be able to connect here on your podcast.

• 3:13Abbey Sharp?

  I love that. Thank you. You as well. Now, before we dive into some kind of bigger societal issues, can you kind of share a little bit about your own journey, you know, both as a pediatrician and as a parent, kind of navigating this world of autism?

• 3:29Speaker 01

  First of all, any diagnosis that your child gets, it's hard. And as a parent, you, what feels like you have a very normally developing child, then for some reason, all of a sudden is becoming delayed and not appearing like their peers, you know? And so that kind of leads me, I could talk about how we actually got Oliver's diagnosis. You know, so he ended up having speech delay. And then just some of his interactions with his peers were not typical. And so he would, I can give some examples, but ultimately, my wife and I, even being pediatricians, we didn't really know if he had autism or not, but there were some signs there, like speech delay, abnormal social interactions. But he was extremely social.

• 4:14Speaker 01

  Like you go on a plane, he wants to say hi to every single person on a plane, right? But that's not necessarily. necessarily socially appropriate and even when he was getting older not realizing that I think was one of the things and so when he saw a developmental pediatrician they were like ah we believe that he has autism and so ultimately again I think some of the reason why it's such a touch point one is any diagnosis is hard and something that I would always tell parents is that diagnosis does not define your child's potential

• 4:44Abbey Sharp?

  yeah

• 4:44Speaker 01

  even if they have whatever diagnosis it may be with earlier interventions with resources you could still help them reach their fullest potential and do not let let societal stigmas deter you from helping them achieve that

• 4:58Abbey Sharp?

  now you know when it comes to autism we've we've seen this resurgence of this fear driven rhetoric largely amplified by you know RFK juniors all these inflammatory statements and other dominant voices within the Maha movement what do you feel it is about autism specifically that just makes it such a flashpoint for like fear and stigma and conspiracy theories

• 5:23Speaker 01

  because autism is generally diagnosed anywhere from like around 18 months to even you know two and a half years old sometimes earlier sometimes later what happens is a child that is developing between the age of birth and one it's kind of hard to catch some of the delays especially speech delay and social interactions being some of the key diagnostic criteria for autism people believe their child is completely developing completely normal and it does appear like that but once they reach the milestones once they get 18 months two years of age those social interactions and the speech really really becomes more apparent and it just so happens that vaccines happening between

• 6:03Speaker 01

  four months six months nine months go 12 months going on throughout all of development is when we start seeing some of those milestones so it makes a very easy picture to link those associations even though with the research that we have we know it's not true and so I think that's another really hard thing as well and then when you have people that are in positions of power feed into that rhetoric and feed into those fear mongering tactics when they know that they could make loose associations make it seem more credible and I think all of those make it extremely extremely hard

• 6:37Abbey Sharp?

  yeah

• 6:37Speaker 01

  once you throw politics into it it just creates a whole mess of things

• 6:41Abbey Sharp?

  Totally, I could not agree more. And you know, I think also because autism is not just like one thing, right? It's a spectrum. And I think that variability makes it very hard for people to understand clearly and also just so easy for misinformation to spread. Because there is such a wide range of presentations when it comes to autism.

• 7:06Speaker 01

  For sure. I'm so glad you brought that up, especially because that's like one of the key things that people are kind of like inquiring on now is like, well, if you look in the 1960s to today, autism rates have skyrocketed. You know, and that is, that's true, right? Like if you look at just the rates and look at absolutely nothing else, that is true. But you have to look into everything else. And so some of those things would be our diagnostic criteria catches a lot more children. Not only that awareness from not only pediatricians, but parents, the general public, and knowing what to look for also has skyrocketed and increased as well. The other thing is before the new diagnostic criteria, there used to be a lot of different diagnoses that are now all lumped into this autism spectrum disorder, which you were talking about.

• 7:52Speaker 01

  And so when you have a very large range of things that all fall under autism, what used to maybe be 10 cases, because there was like a thousand other diagnostic codes or labels, now they're all into one. You put all of those into one bucket, it's going to appear that rates have skyrocketed.

• 8:09Abbey Sharp?

  Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. That is such a good point. And, and, and speaking of just kind of misinformation and misunderstanding, you know, the health secretary has promised that, or had promised, he was going to find the kind of quote, quote, "true cause of autism" by September. And well, I mean, when we're recording this, I don't know when this is going to go out, but we're well into September.

• 8:31Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 8:31Abbey Sharp?

  And we're going to talk about some of the ideas about the cause of autism in more detail in a moment. But, you know, what is the scientific consensus on the cause? Or I guess more accurately, just like the risk factors for your child having autism?

• 8:49Speaker 01

  Yeah, so there we'd say like that we know some things like cause autism or lead to autism. And then there's some risk factors. And so just a couple of things. One would be that we know through research and as science evolves more, that we know that genetics play a very, very large part in autism. And so we know that there are genetic factors. And I think, I think in 15, 20 years, we may know even more in depth and specific about the genetic causes of autism. But we know through sibling studies that genetics plays a very, very large part in it. The second is different environmental factors we know as well cause it.

• 9:28Speaker 01

  And so some of those could be things with maternal relations or even other environmental factors I'd say aren't as causative, but there may be links. And I think some of those things are what makes it easy to create misinformation around as well.

• 9:46Abbey Sharp?

  Yeah, no, exactly. Neurodivergence is thought to be 70 to 90% genetic. And again, I think parents don't want to, don't like acknowledging that because then they almost feel like, oh, it's their fault. But of course, your genes are never your fault. And there's, you know, over 100 genes that have been linked to autism traits that interact to, you know, to determine where or if someone lands on the spectrum. And then, you know, other things like advanced paternal age or complications during pregnancy and delivery, maybe some medications, not vaccines, we'll get to that in a moment. But, you know, those may interact with those who are genetically predisposed.

• 10:26Speaker 01

  Predisposed.

• 10:27Abbey Sharp?

  It's multifactorial. It's not just like one thing happens and then bam, your kid, you know, catches autism. As it's, it seems to, it seems like that's the, the general narrative that we see right now.

• 10:39Speaker 01

  Yeah, and I love how you said that, how that we know that there's a genetic component, right? And then if someone is predisposed because that genetic component, then environmental factors could, you know, I, I guess. Increase the likelihood of them developing or having autism. And I, I think we see that. And something else that I think is really hard for parents is, um, there's no one else with autism in my family, right? And so, how are you saying it's genetic if no one else in my family has autism? Well, and the reason being is just because that our son has my genes, my wife's genes, that doesn't mean that his genes aren't still different, right?

• 11:15Abbey Sharp?

  Yep.

• 11:15Speaker 01

  So, I do not have Lamm-Schafer syndrome. My wife does not have Lamm-Schafer syndrome. We did genetic testing and neither of us have it, or even have the gene defect that would lead to it, but yet our son has it. And we know that Lamm-Schafer syndrome is genetic, right? And so, just even with his two diagnoses in general, you could kind of see just because we say it's genetic, doesn't mean that it has to come from the parents' genes somehow.

• 11:40Abbey Sharp?

  Right. Yeah, that's a really good reminder. Now, I want to talk a little bit about some of these kind of quote, quote, "causes." Um, you know, there's a, a big times article, um, that alleged that RFK Jr. may blame Tylenol and folate deficiency in pregnancy for autism. Um, and if I can just kind of speak to the latter for a moment, you know, we do have some evidence that very low and very high levels of folate in pregnancy may alter neurodevelopment. So, for example, some studies have shown that supplementing with folic acid has been associated with a 23% reduced risk of autism. But then having super high plasma levels, like four times what is normal, is associated

• 12:24Abbey Sharp?

  with twice the risk of a child having autism. Um, but again, most of these studies are very small and they only look at one measurement once and the findings are super duper mixed. But still, you know, this has led to an interest in giving a form of folate called folic acid to children with autism. What are your thoughts on the idea of this kind of becoming just like a universal recommendation for for kids?

• 12:52Speaker 01

  Yeah, I don't think that the the broad evidence would support it, especially so a lot of the the thought process is that parents want to give it because they're promised that the phaline acid will improve the symptoms of autism. And then you have some parents that anecdotally say, when I started giving phaline acid, they completely got better. And then you'll have other parents that say, nothing happened at all. And so I think, you know, some of that plays into when you look at anecdotal data, you have to say, what else is going on during these times when we're giving the medications? Some of which could be the child's getting over older and more mature and some of those behaviors are going away. Or maybe there was a stressor at school that now has disappeared, or there's literally so many factors

• 13:33Speaker 01

  that can play into a child's behavior, getting better or worse, that anecdotal data doesn't really help us entirely. Although I think it's still important to keep in mind. I think when we look at the more broad data, we see that it doesn't necessarily have an effect or an improvement on behavior. Now, if we did have a large study that showed that and like solidified, like, hey, look at this, like, we tried this, we've tested it. And it does see that it improves behaviors, which I think you'd have to come up with some sort of scale of like, how are we going to measure the behaviors that is standardized across children with autism? And then also discussing the confounding factors of like the age that it's given and are they in school or are they out of school and like all those things.

• 14:15Speaker 01

  So ultimately, I just say that the data does not necessarily support that. And so I would not be recommending it to parents. And I think also you have to, like, everyone's always talking about Big Pharma. But to recommend a supplement that's not proven to help, kind of seems like you're, people are playing into the hands of a big wellness or a big supplement. And so I just wouldn't go down that road quite yet until we have a lot more data supporting it.

• 14:44Abbey Sharp?

  Yeah, yeah. I mean, when we look at the research, like, there's some very small studies. They found that, like, high-dose folic acid given to kids with autism, who also test positive for having what we call FRAAs, or folate receptor autoantibodies, may help with things like language communication skills, other core ASD symptoms. But this is, like, not a universal treatment, and so the effects are far less consistent with kiddos who don't also have these FRAAs. And, like, everything's a risk-benefit, because, yeah, you see, some studies may show some kind of benefit for some kiddos, but there's also case studies and studies, case reports and studies,

• 15:28Abbey Sharp?

  that have showed increased hyperactivity

• 15:31Speaker 01

  Right.

• 15:31Abbey Sharp?

  and irritability and aggression and sleep disturbances. Plus, you know, like, there's concern about seizure control, because folate metabolism interacts with neurotransmitters, and it can also mask B12 deficiency. So, like you, like, I don't want parents to hear this and then go, "Ooh, if my child has autism, I'm gonna start mega-dosing with folate, without that careful supervision." We don't have the data to know what is the appropriate dosage. Is it going to, you know, how do we, you know, manage the risk-benefit analysis? All that. So, yeah. We have to be very cautious with the, with the, with the, kind of, interventions we jump on.

• 16:13Speaker 01

  Yeah, I agree with that completely. I'd say, like, if parents are, like, at their wits' end, and they're like, "Look, we've tried everything, we don't know what to do. We just are so tired and we have to try something." Then I'd say, "Talk to your pediatrician about that." So that if you are gonna try something, even if it may not be recommended, that your pediatrician can guide you and say, like, "Look, I'm not recommending this, but if you're gonna do this anyway, let's try to do it as safely as possible." You know, and so I think talking to your pediatrician about those things, and it's completely okay to be completely open and transparent with your pediatrician, and just say, "Look, like, we can't take this anymore, we need help." So is there some way, somehow, that we can find answers or find help? And I think that's super important to have, that open relationship. Relationship with your pediatrician.

• 16:56Speaker 01

  And if you don't feel you have that relationship with your pediatrician, I would say get a different one. And I know that that's easy for me to say when I, I, you know, work at a clinic where I could just get my kids seen by my wife's colleagues. Or whatever it may be, when some people have an extremely hard time finding a doctor or a pediatrician. And so I just say, whenever you're looking for one, shop around, find one that you um think gels well with your family. And that you really feel that you could be open with.

• 17:23Abbey Sharp?

  Yeah, I think that's really important.

• 17:37Abbey Sharp?

  Now, of course, the other alleged cause of autism, according to Bobby, is Tylenol use in pregnancy. And I know you're not a gynecologist, but you're dad and a doctor, and I'm sure you know that Tylenol continues to be the recommended treatment for fever in for women during pregnancy. And this is kind of important because untreated fevers in pregnancy are linked to a wide range of known risks for baby, including ironically autism. And you know, I had two successful pregnancies. We were all told by our doctor, you know, don't take Advil, take Tylenol, it is totally safe for baby.

• 18:13Abbey Sharp?

  And now with these headlines essentially suggesting, oh, no, it's not, you know, women, you know, if you take a Tylenol, you're going to, you know, your kid's going to get autism. Well, women are left feeling like, you know, the person that they trusted in this very overwhelming process, which is pregnancy. You know, to not let them down to to have the answers may have caused their baby irreparable harm. Um, and I'm going to talk about why not freak out about the Tylenol thing in a minute, but what do you think that this association might do when it comes to, you know, all the already crumbling trust that folks have in medical authority?

• 18:50Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's a really good question. And again, I'll reiterate, I'm not an OB-GYN. And so ACOG has put out statements about Tylenol use in pregnancy. And I will just say that, to me, I think this is extremely detrimental for a few reasons. One, just as you said, Abbey, that, you know, that these patients trusted their physicians. And if ACOG and their OB-GYNs and maybe even the pediatricians told mothers that it was okay to use Tylenol, and then you see someone in a place of authority saying that that's wrong and that it causes autism, obviously, that could break that relationship between patient and physician when it's not necessary, especially when it's not true. And so that's one, I think, very detrimental aspect of it.

• 19:32Speaker 01

  The second thing is it kind of, I guess you could say, on one hand, it puts the blame on the doctor for recommending it. But the second part of that is telling mothers that they did something wrong, that you took this and it caused this in your child, and therefore, like, you shouldn't have done that. And I just don't think that's fair. I don't think that having that kind of situation to make mothers feel like they did something that led to their children to have autism is okay, just because we know that that is not true. That there, if, for all the parents out there, if your child has autism, there's nothing that you did that led to that. Like, that is an unfortunate, or I shouldn't say unfortunate, my child has autism. And I, even though I get hate on social media for, what do they people say?

• 20:17Speaker 01

  For, like, glorifying or making autism seem like the most amazing thing in the world. But, you know, like, I love my son so much, and autism is part of who he is. It doesn't define who he is, but it's part of who he is, and I love all of it. And so the diagnosis did not come from something that you did, and I don't want you to have any guilt about that. And so I think, I think that...

• 20:42Speaker 01

  Just that narrative is dangerous in a multitude of different ways. The third way that I think that is dangerous is that now you may have moms, like you said, that have read these hot headlines and now they're pregnant. And now they get a fever and they feel miserable, whether they have a virus or whatever it may be. Um, they feel absolutely terrible and now they're afraid to take anything. And Abbey, I know that you're going to go more into this, but we know the associations of fever infections and other things leading to harm to baby and potentially um associations with autism as well. And so I think that you just put moms in an extremely challenging place and I don't think that's okay. Especially when the data is not clear on it.

• 21:22Abbey Sharp?

  A hundred percent and and and we can't really get good data on women in pregnancy because it's kind of, you know, it would never pass ethics to do a randomized control trial on people who were, you know, carrying babies. Um, but you know, but the Tylenol, I don't want to glaze over the faulty science here that has informed these headlines because this is largely based on, you know, an observational study that found a 20% higher risk of autism and a 30% higher risk of ADHD for kids who had prolonged exposure to Tylenol or acetaminophen during pregnancy. And smaller amounts did not seem to kind of increase the potential risk. But the critical confounders were not even taken accounted for, including the fact that,

• 22:07Abbey Sharp?

  like we said, maternal fever is a known risk factor for changes in fetal neurodevelopment. And when you look at sibling studies, including one that had over 2.4 million kids, they actually found that all these associations disappeared and there was no increased risk of autism or ADHD or intellectual disability with prenatal Tylenol use. So, you know, like you said, kids, some kids are just going to be neurodivergent and some aren't. And I love that. And I know that's hard for families to grapple with because we always want to be in control of everything in this world that is, you know, becoming more and more uncertain. But that that that is the reality right now.

• 22:50Speaker 01

  Yeah, and with these studies that you're talking about, Abbey, so and I'm sure that your listeners understand what confounding factors mean, but so for example, it'd be that if mother, say, she has a fever and then because of the fever, she takes Tylenol, how can you say that it was the Tylenol that caused the autism and not the fever? And so if you don't account for the fever, then you just leave that out of the picture, then it would make you think that Tylenol causes it. And not only that, there could be a like hundreds of hundreds more confounding factors throughout that, and if you do not account for them, then it can make something seem causative when it's not actually causative because there are so many other factors that you didn't take into account for.

• 23:29Abbey Sharp?

  Absolutely, and that is, that's a huge problem when it comes to to research in pregnancy because again, we can't control confounders, like we can't do a randomized controlled trial where we can manipulate all the different variables. We're just looking at women and what they did after the fact of pregnancy. And you know, like you said, like this disregard for the nuance of science that we're talking about, this critical analysis and research is is very quickly eroding just public trust in doctors like you. And and I think perhaps the most dangerous outcome of this is the decline in vaccine confidence, which you kind of alluded to earlier. Because despite the mountain of evidence very, very clearly showing that vaccines do

• 24:14Abbey Sharp?

  not cause or play a role in autism, we have RFK Junior, who has known ties to anti-vaccine groups, just like conjuring up this hysteria citing flawed research that suggests there's some kind of link. As both a pediatrician and a parent of a neurodivergent child, how does it feel to hear from parents who portray autism as so tragic that they are willing to risk their child dying from a preventable disease like polio or measles just so they don't become autistic?

• 24:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, for sure. I think. There is, um, before I answer the question, I want to say that I understand that autism is on a spectrum. Okay, and so when people see my life and they see Oliver and they see that Oliver has autism, they see that at one end of the spectrum, but I'm well aware that there's another end of the spectrum where life can be extremely difficult. Um, I've actually worked with autism, uh, children with autism since I was 16 years old, um, all the way through my high school years, my college years, um, and then ended up having a child with autism. And I have worked with children that had, I'd say debilitating behavioral, um, issues due be, due to some neurodivergent tendencies that they had.

• 25:36Speaker 01

  And that was extremely hard for the family. Um, whether that be self-injurious behavior or destructive behavior, whatever it may be, those years and challenges for the family was extremely, extremely difficult. And so when I say what I'm about to say, I just don't want listeners to think that I do not see and understand that side of it as well. But to say that autism is such a terrible thing, that you would rather your child have, um, meningitis, which is an infection in the brain caused by bacteria, measles or the complications of measles later on down the road,

• 26:19Speaker 01

  which could be inflammation of the brain, um, that could be life-threatening or a multitude of other things, I do not think is correct. And I think when we see the risks of potentially not having,

• 26:32Speaker 01

  uh, protection from these viruses and bacteria versus the potential link of to have, or, I, I'd say not even a link, but anyway, having autism, I think it becomes very, very apparent that the risk of all these viruses and bacteria are so much worse and detrimental to our health, especially when even taking those two things aside, especially when we look at the data and see that it's not true. And I think what upsets me the most is that you have these parents that are putting their trust, um, into these political leaders instead of physicians at this time because of the trust that's been lost throughout the past half a decade, maybe or decade. And then so they're relying on these people to give

• 27:14Speaker 01

  them credible information that they are choosing life altering decisions for their children with. And when it comes to vaccines, we have seen that vaccines are safe and efficacious and have eradicated diseases and comorbidities from viruses and bacteria that used to back in the day were extremely detrimental. And unfortunately, due to this mistrust, there was just a couple polls that were published, one in early August and one just recently and then NBC just posted another one that vaccination rates across the United States are drastically falling. And so over in the last five years, it's dropped from around 95% of all children to now closer to 91

• 27:53Speaker 01

  to 92%. And we know for herd immunity, depending on which bacteria or virus, we need like 95% or above. And so that is very concerning.

• 28:04Abbey Sharp?

  Yeah, no, I know. And I also want to acknowledge that any, like you said earlier, any diagnosis, whether we're talking about neurodevelopmental or, you know, physical is is is so hard for families, especially, you know, when they're parenting multiple kids with different needs. So I don't want to downplay that there are real challenges when it comes to parenting a child with with autism in, you know, not in all cases, but certainly in some. But I certainly do get rubbed the wrong way when I hear people who are in support of vaccines even say like, well, come on, like an autistic child is better than a dead one. Because while of course, that is true, I think that stigma that that statement is just so stigmatizing to

• 28:47Abbey Sharp?

  neurodivergent folks. And it also almost validates this false association between vaccines and autism. And this harms everyone because it harms it harms our neurodivergent friends, our new parents who have been made to feel that they maybe have done something hugely wrong if their child is on the spectrum. And it also harms neurotypical folks who are now susceptible to the downstream risks of low vaccine uptake, which is what you're you're discussing here. So this is this is not, this is not good for anybody right now.

• 29:19Speaker 01

  No, not at all. And so Abbey, have you watched the movie The Unbreakable Child?

• 29:24Abbey Sharp?

  You know what? I don't think I have.

• 29:26Speaker 01

  But so it is, um, I've even just thinking about it, I'm about to cry. I just think I, I literally am about to cry just thinking about this movie. So I think it is like one of the most incredible movies. And so it's about a boy who has osteogenesis imperfecta. And for the listeners, that's just, you can think of it as like having brittle bones. But he also has autism and you see into his world of living with autism. And you see this dad that doesn't understand his child at all. And then comes to understand, um, his child's, I think, diagnoses and how his child feels through seeing him live his life. And it's just like one of the, even as a father to a son who has autism, that I think that I'm

• 30:09Speaker 01

  very in tuned with Oliver. It even made me realize even more, um, what Oliver's experiencing and why he might have some of these behaviors at times. And like, I'm getting so frustrated, like Oliver, just like, be calm, like calm down. But it's like, he needs this, like he, like some of these things, like he's experiencing, we can't grasp or understand what it is. And that doesn't make it wrong and that doesn't make it bad. It just makes it different for him. And I just think it is such a great movie that would help the world understand autism so much more.

• 30:45Abbey Sharp?

  I love that recommendation. I will definitely, I'll link to that in the show notes below.

• 31:04Abbey Sharp?

  And not to be dark, but again, as a pediatrician, as a dad, what do you feel, like, what is your biggest fear as it relates to this kind of like autism witch hunt that the health secretary and the Maha movement has begun?

• 31:20Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think a few things. One would be further stigmatizing children with autism. Um, or I mean, adults with autism, anyone with autism, anybody that's neurodivergent. Uh, just because even, even some of the language that they use when talking about it, um, is very stigmatizing. And I made a video that RFK Junior was talking about children with autism and was talking about they'll never pay taxes, they'll never live on their own, they'll never do any of these things. And like, he may feel like that and he may think that, but that's not truth and that's not reality. Is that true for some children? Maybe. Is it true for all of them? Not at all. And so I think that just the language in, um, people, the society further stigmatizing children with autism, I think is extremely detrimental.

• 32:04Speaker 01

  Um, number two would be policy changes if they continue to try to go down this route of false information and saying that vaccines cause autism and maybe them not allowing for certain vaccines to be covered by insurance or their recommendations going down about hepatitis B or, um, MMR or these vaccines and then not making them required. We're already seeing vaccinations rates declining to 92% and we've already seen the most cases of measles that we've seen in decades. Um, to see that further, uh, worsen and then to see what used to be almost eradicated diseases now become a lot more prevalent. And we see herd immunity lost and then a lot more children getting sick. Like, it would be

• 32:48Speaker 01

  it an absolute tragedy to have to repeat the medical harm, um, that happened from viruses and bacteria that we, that the world experienced decades ago because of misinformation.

• 33:03Abbey Sharp?

  Yeah, a hundred percent. I think those are all things to be very nervous about. I mean, I, I'm gonna go darker for me and me. Like, I, I have a tendency to, to spiral when it comes to some of these things and, you know, uh, we just have to look at history of eugenics and the treatment of disabled people to feel that there is a possibility if autism is cast as this quote-unquote epidemic that, you know, we need to eliminate. Could our wonderful and neurodivergent children be catalogued or targeted or treated as like second-class citizens just based on their diagnosis? And I worry that the shame and the judgment of all of this being caused by, you know,

• 33:46Abbey Sharp?

  moms quote-unquote "bad choices" will also mean that fewer families are going to want to even get a diagnosis.

• 33:53Speaker 01

  Right.

• 33:53Abbey Sharp?

  Which of course then is going to, sure, it's going to make it look like the numbers have gone down, so like, yay, you know, like, removing that food additive, cured all the autism, when in fact, we just know that more kids are suffering without the support they need. And so, none of this is going to be good for our kids.

• 34:11Speaker 01

  Yeah, I agree completely. And even to the point of like, children being institutionalized, when maybe they don't need to, just because of the stigma and the rhetoric behind what people with autism are like. And we know that especially in the, I'd say the 70s through the 90s, there were many different facilities in which people with autism or maybe neurodivergent children that had behavioral issues would be put into, that were violent, abusive, and not okay, which thankfully now, a majority have been shut down throughout the United States. I think unfortunately, there's still a couple that are still practicing. And the type of therapies that they would use, whether that be shock therapies, or

• 34:55Speaker 01

  physical restraint therapies, or whatever they may be, were not beneficial to these children. And my fear is that resurgence of different facilities like this would come about, and I just do not think that's okay. And so, I'm, at the end of the day, an extremely optimistic person as it is, probably to a fault, so I really don't think it'll get that bad, but the fear's still there that it could.

• 35:18Abbey Sharp?

  Right. And I want to harness that optimism and end on a positive note, because I realize a lot of discussions about the state of public health are kind of bleak, right now, but is there anything you could share with parents or soon-to-be parents who perhaps have become paranoid about the prospects of having a child on the spectrum?

• 35:41Speaker 01

  Yeah. What I would say is that...

• 35:48Speaker 01

  If you are someone and you are reading into the headlines that you're seeing online, I would just ask you to not try to, and I know this is like impossible to do, but try to stay out of the conspiracy theory, the conspiracy theory blogs, the conspiracy theory news, and try to stick to the truths. And the truths that we know are that vaccines do not cause autism. That if your child has autism, that there are a multitude of processes in place currently to get your child the support they need. And if you find a pediatrician that'll help you to get that support, then your child can reach their fullest potential, whatever that may be, even if they have autism.

• 36:33Speaker 01

  As a father to a child with autism, even though the initial heartbreak of, will my child be able to go to prom? Will he play football? Will he ever drive? Will he ever live on his own? All of those things are completely normal. But once I came to notice that those were hopes and dreams that I had in my mind for him, and Oliver is his own person, and I need to support what his hopes and dreams are. And right now, it is playing with rocks in the yard, or playing with sand. And seeing his joy for life is one of the most beautiful things. And when I started to align my goals for Oliver with the goals that he had, even if they may be different than what the world would expect for a typical five-year-old,

• 37:18Speaker 01

  my life became so much more beautiful. And finding joy and happiness in the things that make Oliver happy has made me, continues to make me extremely, extremely happy. And so I would just say lean on evidence-based practitioners such as your pediatrician, your OB-GYN, the American Academy of Pediatrics, ACOG, and these organizations that will stop the fear mongering, that will give you real evidence about what's going on, and then will also help you get the support you need, rather than just throw fearful lies at you to make you scared about having a child that may end up with autism.

• 37:58Abbey Sharp?

  Wow, that was so beautiful. Thank you so much, Tommy. So insightful. I'm so moved by your words and your expertise. And I hope it provides some critical new insights for folks who are trying to make sense of all these fear mongering headlines. But I'm going to leave a link to all your social media. Thank you again so much for joining us.

• 38:22Speaker 01

  Such an honor. Thank you.

• 38:25Abbey Sharp?

  I have been so moved by this conversation as someone who is neurodivergent. But I also have to say that getting a diagnosis and treatment in my late 30s was actually a massive positive turning point in my life. Despite all this conversation about neurodivergence being the plague or like an epidemic, I honestly feel that getting a diagnosis got me the sparkle back that I had lost for many, many years, literally over a decade. So for those who are listening who perhaps have a neurodivergent child or is feeling anxious about this fear-driven narrative around autism right now,

• 39:09Abbey Sharp?

  I just want to share a little kind of ode to my own experience to leave us all with a different perspective. I truly love the way my neurodivergent mind works. I love my ability to think outside the box, my passion-driven productivity, my boundless energy, and my persistence, all of which have been critical to my career success. I also am very grateful for my rich intuition and deep empathy, which I really do believe has made me a really good friend. I know, and I feel like everyone in my life knows, that these are real superpowers. These are actually sought-after traits.

• 39:53Abbey Sharp?

  And not just in me, but the vast majority of people that I gravitate towards in my life are also neurodivergent. And obviously, everyone has their own unique flavor. But I've really found that my friends with autism And ADHD are incredibly curious, highly intelligent, creative, magnetic, and compassionate humans that I can't not want to be around. There is no question that having autism or ADHD presents challenges in our neurotypical world, but overcoming those challenges to build greatness, as so many folks with ASD

• 40:35Abbey Sharp?

  do, is actually evidence that we shouldn't be looking to quote cure their minds. And obviously, I don't know if we have like sec reports to back this up, but according to a lot of expert speculation, if we had quote cured autism, we maybe wouldn't have Einstein's relativity, or Mozart's symphonies, or Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel. I'm not knocking our neurotypicals, but it might be a very gray world without neurodiversion people. So rather than investing our energy in this witch hunt for the quote root cause or cure for autism, we should be focusing our research and discussions around building supportive

• 41:20Abbey Sharp?

  environments to let these gorgeous, beautiful minds thrive. And that, my friends, is, I think, all I've got for today. But I would love if you would give Dr. Tommy Martin a follow and leave us a nice little comment and a five star review in the comment section to show your support. It really does mean so much. But signing off with Science and SAS, I'm Abbey Sharp. Thanks for listening.

• 41:56Speaker 03

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