Important Points to Consider

• Without intervention, our children cannot learn the basic life skills and they may become a danger to themselves and to the community. For every $1 we spend now we save $7 on lifelong care.

• The State provides coverage to all autistic children through Medicaid for eligible citizens. Insurance companies do not offer the coverage, even if you pay your premium and typically deny services to an autistic child.

• Parents who consistently provide therapeutic services, with after tax dollars, often risk bankruptcy or sometimes fraudulently divorce to qualify for Medicaid. In many cases this increases the financial burden on the State, since the State must also then provide care for siblings and indigent spouses.

• The average cost of cumulative therapy for children with autism is approximately $20,000 per year and steadily decreases when recommended frequencies are administered consistently.

• The targeted interventions are scientifically proven effective treatments for autism. They have the equivalent effect as a surgical procedure or medication treatments for other afflictions.

• Stroke victims receive speech therapy to retrain other parts of their brain to speak. That same therapeutic concept is equally as, or more effective, on a 4 year old whose language has not yet emerged. Autistic children are denied services by HMO’s because they have not yet acquired speech. Insurers place responsibility on DOE to teach speech.

• Insurance companies and HMOs assert their coverage denials, citing a Supreme Court decision (Cedar Rapids v. Garrett, March 3, 1999). Professional interpretation of this Supreme Court ruling states, “This case is about whether meaningful access to the public schools will be assured, not the level of education that a school must finance once access is attained”. Legally, the DOE is only required to meet the minimal criteria to function in a classroom. Since autistic individuals do not generalize what they learn to different environments, this minimum is not adequate to function in daily life.

• We must achieve equitable access and a better quality of life for children and families not able to provide adequate care and services for their children.