Study Finds Tennessee Child Autism Rate Doubled over Last Decade as Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Trump Admin Seek Answers

A Vanderbilt University Medical Center study published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Tuesday found the rate of children diagnosed with autism in Tennessee doubled over the last decade, with researchers pointing the finger to greater awareness and modern diagnostic practices while leaving open the possibility of an external factor resulting in a higher rate of autism spectrum disorder in young people.

According to VUMC, the research focused on the rate of autism diagnosis among four and eight-year-old children in Middle Tennessee, determining that 3.4 percent of those in the age group have been diagnosed with autism, or one in 29 children.

The research found the rate of autism among children in these age groups more than doubled from 2014, when a study was published showing just 1.5 percent of children, or one in 68, had been diagnosed with autism.

Nationally, research published by the CDC shows one in 31 children in the United States are now diagnosed with autism.

Dr. Zachary Warren, who led the research at VUMC, stated that the increases “certainly relate to increased awareness, changes in diagnostic practices and better prevalence studies themselves” but that there are also likely to be “other complicated factors that are related to a true increase in autism,” which the researchers did not pick up on.

The study and its acknowledgment of possible factors driving an increase in autism comes as U.S. Secretary of Human Services (HHS) Robert F. Kennedy Jr. pledged during a televised cabinet meeting that the Trump administration will conduct “a massive testing and research effort” to determine an external cause for the nationwide increase in autism by September of this year.

“We’ve launched a massive testing and research effort that’s going to involve hundreds of scientists from around the world,” said Kennedy on Thursday. “By September we will know what has caused the autism epidemic, and we’ll be able to eliminate those exposures.”

Kennedy stated during a later interview that the Trump administration’s research effort is “going to look at everything,” including vaccines, which skeptics including Kennedy’s nonprofit, Children’s Health Defense, have argued for decades are linked to autism, despite their claims being dismissed as unsound by the majority in the medical field.

“We’re going to look at vaccines, but we’re going to look at everything,” the HHS director explained. “Everything is on the table, our food system, our water, our air, different ways of parenting, all the kind of changes that may have triggered this epidemic.”

A CDC whistleblower previously claimed data indicating a link between autism and some vaccines in black children was pulled from a study published in 2014

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Tom Pappert is the lead reporter for The Tennessee Star, and also reports for The Pennsylvania Daily Star and The Arizona Sun Times. Follow Tom on X/Twitter. Email tips to [email protected].