Autism cases on the rise nationwide - Nightly News with Brian Williams

Autism cases on the rise nationwide

Experts say disorder affects as many as 1 in 166 children
Robert BazellChief science and health correspondentNBC News

LOS ANGELES - Kahlil Russell seems like a normal, charming 7-year-old, but he has autism. He speaks only a few words and can quickly drift away to where no one �" not even his parents �" can reach him.  

"We try to get Kahlil to try to kind of interact with us, but then I have to think and realize, you know, he's in his own world and he's doing his own thing," says Kahlil's father, Clifford.

Kahlil attends a school for children with the disorder run by the Help Group in Sherman Oaks, Calif. At the school, one can see the range of disabilities the brain disorder can cause �" from mild to severe.

What goes on in the brains of these children?

"They see everything. They hear everything. They feel everything," says Dr. Michael Merzenich at the University of California at San Francisco. "But they can't tell anybody. They can't get it out."

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Most troubling, experts say, is the alarming increase in the number of cases. A few decades ago, autism was almost unheard of. Now it seems to be exploding. In the past decade the number of school-age children getting treatment skyrocketed 600 percent.

"Parents are going to be needing more and more of these types of facilities with the increasing numbers of kids being identified," says Dr. Barbara Firestone, president of the Help Group.

Why the increase?

Dr. Daniel Geschwind at the University of California Los Angeles says one reason is that doctors are diagnosing it more often.

"People are less reluctant to diagnosis autism, or high-functioning autism, in children. And so, some of it is clearly a diagnostic issue," says Geschwind.

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But that's not all. Research so far has cleared childhood vaccines, but there could be other environmental factors.

"This doesn't necessarily mean toxicants," says Geschwind. "It can be anything in the environment that we're exposed to."

To try to find the cause, researchers are scanning the brains of children and adults with autism and looking for genetic factors. They hope that a better understanding of this frightening disorder will help reveal the reasons behind the dramatic increase.

� 2007

South Africa unveils plan to cut HIV spread - AIDS

South Africa unveils plan to cut HIV spread

Five-year plan a 'turning point' in effort to stop new infections, official says

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa - The government proposed a five-year plan Wednesday to cut in half the number of new HIV infections in South Africa, saying it had failed to persuade young people to change their sexual habits.

The government also said the country needed to better address the stigma associated with the disease, which discouraged many people from being agsdhfgdfed, and vowed to expand its treatment and care program to cover 80 percent of people with AIDS.

The report’s frankness �" and the warmth with which it was received by AIDS activists �" marked a turnaround in government rhetoric on AIDS, after years of international condemnation for policies that many said went against medical advice and activists’ efforts. The health minister in particular has been criticized for questioning antiretroviral treatments and promoting nutritional remedies, such as garlic and lemons, to fight the disease.

“This plan marks a turning point in the struggle to stop the HIV/AIDS epidemic,” said Zwelinzima Vavi, the general-secretary of the Congress of South African Trade Unions. “We hail the new spirit, which signals the end to acrimonious debate and the standoff between government and important sectors of our people.”

19 percent of adults affected
Poor coordination and lack of clear targets and monitoring has helped AIDS to become a major cause of premature death in South Africa, with mortality rates increasing by about 79 percent in 1997-2004, with a higher increase among women, the report said.

About 5.54 million people were estimated to be living with HIV in South Africa in 2005, with 19 percent of the adult population affected. Women in the 25-29 age group were the worst affected, with prevalence rates of up to 40 percent.

“There are still too many people living with HIV, too many still getting infected,” the report said. “The impact on individuals and households is enormous.” Children were also vulnerable, with high rates of mother-to-child transmission.

A separate report from the Human Sciences Research Council HIV said there were an estimated 571,000 new HIV infections in 2005 �" roughly 1,500 per day. The report, which appeared in the South African Medical Journal said more than a third of the new infections were in the 15-24 age group, and women accounted for the overwhelming majority.

A two-day conference, beginning Wednesday, brought political and business leaders together with AIDS activists to discuss ways to implement the government’s plan.

“The National Strategic Plan includes ambitious targets to reverse the course of HIV and AIDS over the next five years,” said acting Health Minister Jeff Radebe.

He was appointed last month to replace Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang, who left her duties due to illness. Since taking over, Radebe has sought to mend fences with doctors and AIDS activists, including the main Treatment Action Campaign group, after years of Tshabalala-Msimang advising South Africans that natural remedies were better for fighting AIDS than antiretrovirals.

Change behavior
Deputy President Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, appointed last year to efforts in revamping the country’s AIDS strategy, said the government had set aside $1.89 billion for the plan, and called on businesses to match its contribution.

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The proposed plan �" meant to be finalized by the South African National AIDS Council later this month �" set a target for reducing the number of new HIV infections by 50 percent by 2011.

To reach the target, it called for more effort in empowering women, who often are targeted in sexual abuse, and to encourage people to be agsdhfgdfed for the virus.

More also must be done to promote behavior change in young people, the report said.

Mlambo-Ngcuka urged youths to delay their first sexual experiences.

“We would like to make sure our young people believe there can be and there will be an Africa free of AIDS,” she said.

Nearly 250,000 people are receiving antiretroviral therapy �" about 20 percent of the estimated number of people living with HIV.

� 2007 . .

How the Terror-Suspect Compromise Evolved - Newsweek Terror Watch

Change of Heart

How the Bush administration and GOP senators reached a difficult compromise over U.S. treatment of terror detainees.
Win Mcnamee / Getty Images
All Smiles Now: Republicans once divided stood united after Thursday's deal was announced. From left, Rep. Duncan Hunter, Sen. John Cornyn, national-security adviser Stephen Hadley, Sen. John McCain, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, Sen. Lindsey Graham and Sen. John Warner.

WEB EXCLUSIVEMark HosenballNewsweek

Sept. 22, 2006 - Three renegade Republican senators may be the biggest winners in Thursday’s deal between the White House and Capitol Hill over the treatment of high-level terror detainees. The senators, John McCain, Lindsey Graham and John Warner, had led the opposition to the Bush administration's plans to redefine how the United States would apply the Geneva Conventions to terror detainees.

Two sources close to negotiations between the two sides tell NEWSWEEK that key elements of the deal were first floated by the senators as long as a week ago. (The sources familiar with the negotiations asked for anonymity because of the continuing political sensitivity of the issue.) At one point several days ago, says one of the sources, it looked like the two sides were getting close to an agreement. But the White House then backed away from the negotiations and took a hard line for several days�"for reasons that remain unclear.

But by Thursday, the administration essentially agreed to the McCain-Graham-Warner proposal that it had previously rejected. What caused this change of heart? The sources say it was clear that the GOP renegades’ position was supported by at least 51 senators. By the same token, an important element in the compromise, the sources say, was the recognition by Graham, McCain and Warner all along that neither they nor a majority of their Senate colleagues really wanted to put the CIA interrogation program completely out of business.

During a five-hour closed-door meeting Thursday on Capitol Hill, the rebel senators and their aides hammered out an agreement with White House representatives. Initially, administration officials, including President Bush, had indicated in public remarks that they believed the CIA interrogation and detention program could only go forward if Congress passed legislation clarifying an allegedly “vague” clause in the 60-year-old Geneva Conventions, an international treaty governing the treatment of prisoners. But Senators McCain, Graham and Warner maintained that international law does not permit the United States to reinterpret treaties ratified by Congress years after they went into force. If Congress did this, the senators argued, then foreign countries could reinterpret the Geneva Conventions in the event they capture American soldiers overseas and want to interrogate them using harsh methods.

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Men and Depression: New Treatments - Newsweek Health

Men & Depression: Facing Darkness

By By Julie ScelfoNewsweek

Feb. 26, 2007 issue - For nearly a decade, while serving as an elected official and working as an attorney, Massachusetts state Sen. Bob Antonioni struggled with depression, although he didn't know it. Most days, he attended Senate meetings and appeared on behalf of clients at the courthouse. But privately, he was irritable and short-tempered, ruminating endlessly over his cases and becoming easily frustrated by small things, like deciding which TV show to watch with his girlfriend. After a morning at the state house, he'd be so exhausted by noon that he'd drive home and collapse on the couch, unable to move for the rest of the day.

When his younger brother, who was similarly moody, killed himself in 1999, Antonioni, then 40, decided to seek help. For three years, he clandestinely saw a therapist, paying in cash so there would be no record. He took antidepressants, but had his prescriptions filled at a medicament 20 miles away. His depression was his burden, and his secret. He couldn't bear for his image to be any less than what he thought it should be. "I didn't want to sound like I couldn't take care of myself, that I wasn't a man," says Antonioni.

Then, in 2002, his chief of staff discovered him on the floor of his state-house office, unable to stop crying. Antonioni, now 48, decided he had to open up to his friends and family. A few months later, invited to speak at a mental-health vigil, he found the courage to talk publicly about his problem. Soon after, a local reporter wrote about Antonioni's ongoing struggle with the disease. Instead of being greeted with jeers, he was hailed as a hero, and inundated with cards and letters from his constituents. "The response was universally positive. I was astounded."

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A Depression Screening Test

Six million American men will be diagnosed with depression this year. But millions more suffer silently, unaware that their problem has a name or unwilling to seek treatment. In a confessional culture in which Americans are increasingly obsessed with their health, it may seem clich� d�"men are from Mars, women from Venus, and all that�"to say that men tend not to take care of themselves and are reluctant to own up to mental illness. But the facts suggest that, well, men tend not to take care of themselves and are reluctant to own up to mental illness. Although depression is emotionally crippling and has numerous medical implications�"some of them deadly�"many men fail to recognize the symptoms. Instead of talking about their feelings, men may mask them with alcohol, drug abuse, gambling, anger or by becoming workaholics. And even when they do realize they have a problem, men often view asking for help as an admission of weakness, a betrayal of their male identities.

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