Stimulus Money Set to Fund Autism Research

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) yesterday committed $60 million from the stimulus package to fund research goals for autism laid out in the first federal 'strategic plan' for autism research. That plan, published 5 March, and crafted by a federal advisory panel over the past year, recommends 40 research studies with a projected cost of $800 million over the next decade.In passing the Combating Autism Act in December 2006, Congress charged the Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee (IACC) — comprising 13 federal and 6 public members — with creating a strategic plan to help the Secretary of Health and Human Services set priorities for autism research. The IACC solicited input for this plan from both scientific experts and parent advocates, whose prerogatives were frequently in conflict.The final plan recommends studying how autism affects people throughout life — from sequencing more than 50 candidate genes and identifying at least five environmental risk factors to studying the cost-effectiveness of services that aid adults with autism.Read more at...SFARI, March 2009.