Governments, educators, families and public health officials face mounting challenges in dealing with autism as the prevalence in the U.S. continues to grow. In the concluding segment in his Autism Now series, Robert MacNeil explores these issues and possible solutions in a roundtable with four autism researchers and advocates.
Joining MacNeil are Dr. Thomas Insel, director of the National Institute of Mental Health, which directs federal funding for autism research; Catherine Lord, professor of psychology, pediatrics and psychiatry at the University of Michigan; Ilene Lainer, a lawyer and executive director of the New York Center for Autism, a private advocacy group; and Jon Shestack, a Hollywood producer and the co-founder of a former advocacy group, Cure Autism Now. Both Ms. Lainer and Mr. Shestack are parents of children with autism, and as we said at the beginning of this series, MacNeil is the grandfather of a child with autism.