Health Secretary orders probe into autistic youngsters locked in NHS ‘hell holes’ across the UK | Daily Mail Online

Health Secretary Matt Hancock has ordered an urgent investigation into why youngsters are being locked up like criminals because they have autism or learning difficulties, just days after The Mail on Sunday revealed their appalling plight.

Mr Hancock was ‘deeply shocked’ by this newspaper’s account last week of children as young as 13 being incarcerated, sometimes for years, in NHS-funded assessment and treatment units, known as ATUs.

Our exposé, based on numerous detailed interviews with distraught individuals and families, found evidence of routine abuse of children and young people kept in the secretive facilities.

 

Source: Health Secretary orders probe into autistic youngsters locked in NHS ‘hell holes’ across the UK  | Daily Mail Online

Autism: Anti-cancer drug may improve social behavior : Medical News Today

New research led by the State University of New York at Buffalo suggests that an anti-cancer drug may be able to reverse social impairments associated with autism.

In a paper now published in the journal Nature Neuroscience, the investigators report how low doses of romidepsin — a drug approved in the United States for the treatment of lymphoma — “restored gene expression and reversed social deficits” in a mouse model of autism.

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD), which is a developmental condition, affects behavior, social interaction, and communication.

Statistics that were compiled in the U.S. suggest that 1 in 68 children have ASD and that it is around four to five times more common in boys than in girls.

Source: Autism: Anti-cancer drug may improve social behavior : Medical News Today