Staggering New CDC Data Shows Autism Rates Surge to 1 in 31 U.S. Children, 1 in 20 Boys

The CDC’s Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring (ADDM) Network has just released alarming new data showing autism now impacts 1 in every 31 eight-year-old children in the U.S. and 1 in 10 boys.

Thanks for reading The Kennedy Beacon! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.

In California, the report says, the autism rate is 1 in 12.5.

The new findings, to be posted here later today, are based on data collected by ADDM in 2022 that draws from an analysis of 4-year-old and 8-year-old children who lived in 16 different areas across the U.S.

“The autism rate continues to skyrocket—with no signs of slowing down,” the CDC’s new report reads. “Autism now affects 1 in 31 children—or 3.2% of all 8-year-olds born in 2014. This marks the highest rate ever recorded, and the trend shows no signs of abating.”

The report continues, “These rates represent an unprecedented level of need.”

Further, the new data finds the rise is accelerating. Just two years ago, the rate was 1 in 36. That means autism prevalence has jumped 17% in only two years. Since the first report on children born in 1992, autism rates have increased nearly fivefold—a trend that shows no sign of slowing.

Rates are rising fastest among children of color, according to the report. Autism now affects children of color — including Asian/Pacific Islander, Black, Hispanic, and Multiracial children — at significantly higher rates than White children, by as much as 40%. “This alarming shift underscores the urgent need to identify why these communities are being hit hardest,” the report reads.

This news is shocking to me, and I’m not easily shocked as two of my sons have autism.

Autism’s Windy Road

I begin my hike with my son, Thomas, on a grey winter day in the Rockefeller State Park Preserve.

Thomas is a twenty-five-year-old strapping young man with broad shoulders and dark brown eyes that he got from his mom.

Thomas has autism.

He has difficulty using words. However, he knows these trails well. As Thomas starts down one of them, he turns to me and says, “Walk.”

And so we do.

As we walk, the quiet of the woods surrounds us. The trees have shed their leaves. There is a light cover of snow. The air is cold and, as I exhale, I see my breath before me. I am sixty-four and Thomas is taller than me. He walks faster than me.

But to me, he is still my little boy. Thomas was the smallest of the triplet boys that his mom heroically carried to damn near full term back in 2000.

Back when the CDC reported that the autism rate was 1 in 150.

We walk on.

I was working in law enforcement in 2000, just north of New York City, when some maniacs crashed their planes into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and then, thanks to brave Americans, a field in rural Pennsylvania, far away from their intended target.

The next two years were a blur of meetings in places we began calling “bunkers” that just months before were simply training rooms at the local police academy. There were meetings with people from state and federal agencies. “If you see something, say something,” we were told. “Be on the lookout for unusual activity.”

Did these people ever study your typical New Yorker? We do unusual things like the English do tea. What is odd for everyone else is just your typical Empire State resident. Robert DeNiro as Travis Bickle in Taxi Driver is one of our patron saints.

Days and weeks after 9/11 there were whispers of plots involving dirty bombs, made of spent radioactive material. Whispers of mercury bombs made of, well, medical products.

An officer raises her hand. “Why is there mercury in medical products?”

An administrator responds. “They use it in vaccines and other medical products…It’s a neurotoxin.”

My kids keep all their “well baby” pediatric appointments. They got all their vaccines.

It is now 2004. Two of my sons have an autism diagnosis. That was back when the CDC reported that the autism rate was 1 in 125. We were told that the perceived increase is due to better diagnosing.

Thomas and I walk on. I stop to grab his shoulder and point to a dear, frozen in place, looking right at us. I realize that there are two other white tails a few feet away from the one I noticed.

I did not see them all until I saw the one.

It is 2006 and Congress has responded to the ever increasing autism rate by passing the Combating Autism Act. The disorder was now called a ‘public health concern’ by CDC even though we are told that the increase is due, again, to “better diagnosing” and to “better recognition” of the disorder.

In 2006, the CDC reported the autism rate at 1 in 110.

In 2008, I began to wonder whether autism is linked to childhood vaccinations. I am home sick with the flu when I watch a press conference about a child who will be compensated by the Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) in something called the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program – ‘The Vaccine Court’ – because she developed what then CDC Director Dr. Julie Gerberding described her as having “autism-like symptoms.”

In its coverage, “Deal in an Autism Case Fuels Debate on Vaccine,” The New York Times refers to the decision as a “deal.” The real deal is that if you have symptoms of autism, you have autism. Dr. Gerberding said that the one case was “rare,” but I know bullshit when I see it: The federal government conceded that a vaccine injury caused this kid’s autism. That’s a major concession that the media didn’t acknowledge.

That was 2008, the year the CDC reported an autism rate of 1 in 88.

Because I have a troubling tendency to indulge my inclination for investigation, I decided to see if there were other cases in this vaccine court. It took two years, but, with colleagues, we found dozens more – of vaccine-induced brain damage that also included autism. The federal government was quietly but justifiably compensating families of the victims but never told the public what they had done in secret “proceedings” under the auspices of “Special Masters” – not actual judges.

We published our findings here.

Those Special Masters who run the vaccine court held hearings called the Omnibus Autism Proceedings and ruled against approximately 5,000 families who claimed that vaccines caused their children’s autism, even though they certainly knew about the previous cases. The Special Masters kept all those old cases in dusty files in the backrooms at the Court of Claims and out of the proceedings.

That was 2010, a year when the CDC reported autism rates at 1 in 68. The increased rate was just an artifact, the CDC said, of “better diagnosing.” We were, predictably, attacked. And as we continued to research the vaccine court and expose the truth, we faced what we now call “The Playbook.”

Around this time, the current CEO of Children's Health Defense, Mary Holland, and I started to work with Robert F. Kennedy Jr., now Secretary of HHS. Kennedy studied our work and the advocacy efforts of other parents and did something that few public figures did.

He listened.

Over the next few years, we saw parents of children with autism, who questioned vaccine safety, slandered in the public square. And so was Kennedy.

Slander became abuse and censorship. Big pharma, which had cut its teeth on autism, went into overdrive during Covid.

The autism rate seemed to level off in 2012 but then the data turned ominous. In 2014, the CDC reported autism rates at 1 in 59.

In 2016, Kennedy met with Trump to discuss vaccine safety and spiking autism rates. A team of federal bureaucrats, led by Dr. Anthony Fauci, sabotaged the initiative.

Meanwhile, the CDC reported autism at 1 in 54.

Kennedy then did something that no one before him had. He understood that the country was experiencing a massive decline in health. It was not just autism. It was diabetes, food allergies, neurological disorders, obesity – the plague of chronic disease.

The Great Poisoning.

In 2018, the CDC reported an autism rate of 1 in 44.

In 2020, as the Covid pandemic upended the nation and effectively suspended the U.S. Constitution, the CDC reported autism at 1 in 36.

Kennedy raised the alarm. He ran for president on a platform that prioritized chronic illness and making America healthy again. Big Pharma and their “captured” legacy media unleashed a flamethrower version of the playbook on him.

The playbook stung Kennedy but it did not stop him.

In the past four years the families of children with autism have joined forces with the Covid vaccine injured and all the other souls caught up in the Great Poisoning.

Now we all see the many when we see the one.

The MAHA moms – the MAHA warriors – have risen up.

Kennedy was nominated, confirmed, and rolled up his sleeves at HHS. The wins are coming, state by state and for the nation as a whole.

With Trump’s backing, Kennedy has a generational opportunity to end the Great Poisoning. But he still needs our help.

On February 4, President Trump stated on Truth Social, “20 years ago, Autism in children was 1 in 10,000. NOW IT’S 1 in 34. WOW! Something’s really wrong. We need BOBBY!!! Thank You! DJT”

Thomas and I stop along the trail and look out over a lake. The water is icy and still. I point Thomas to a hawk circling high in the sky above. I think about the Native American myth of the Thunderbird. When the Thunderbird appears, rain and wind are not far behind.

In other words, things will get a lot worse before they get better. But then they will get better.

Kennedy is, after all, a falconer.

Thomas turns to me and says, “Walk.”

‍