Nine new members have joined the Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee, which provides “advice and recommendations” on autism to U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. John Gilmore, executive director of the Autism Action Network, said he and the other new members “are picking up the pieces following a generation of profound failure.”
U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. appointed 21 new members to a committee that advises the secretary on autism-related policy and research.
One of the new members, John Gilmore, told The Defender that the committee’s “first order of business” is to “answer the many unanswered questions about autism.”
The Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee (IACC) provides “advice and recommendations” to Kennedy on federal activities related to autism. The committee helps increase public awareness of those activities, including federal policies and government-funded research.
Dr. Sylvia Fogel, an assistant in psychiatry at Massachusetts General Hospital, instructor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and mother of a son with autism, will chair the committee, The Defender has learned.
Other new members of the IACC include:
MARABio has a test out now (blood) that detects the protein that causes the more severe autism conditions. This makes up about 25% of the autism diagnoses. Once detected, the protein can be neutralized resulting in less cases of autism. It’s not a “cure”, but a treatment and it can be tested for prior or during pregnancy, and can be treated prior to conception or after the baby is born. I think the total testing process costs just under $1K, and in many cases it is or will be covered by insurance.