MEDICINE
ADHD seen on rise
One in every six American children has a developmental disability, a 15 percent increase since 1997, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported Monday.
The increase is due almost entirely to an increase in the prevalence of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and is based on reports by parents during a telephone survey, researchers reported in the journal Pediatrics.
But because ADHD has become a catchall phrase for a variety of behavioral problems in schools and elsewhere, it is not clear whether the increase represents a real upsurge in such developmental delays or simply parental and physician attribution of old behaviors to a disorder that might be treated with drugs.
The data came from the 1997-2008 National Health Interview Survey, annual telephone surveys in which interviewers question a representative sample of households about health issues. Parents were asked if their children ages 3 to 17 had been diagnosed with ADHD, intellectual disability, cerebral palsy, autism, seizures, stuttering or stammering, moderate to profound hearing loss, blindness, learning disorders or other developmental delays of any sort.
In 1997-99, 12.84 percent of children were reported to have such a disability. By 2006-08, that proportion had increased to 15.04 percent, a 1.8-million increase that brought the total number of affected children to nearly 10 million.
Boys had the lowest prevalence for most disabilities, while low-income families and those with public-health insurance had the highest prevalence. Hispanic children had the lowest rates of most disabilities.
— Los Angeles Times
NEW YORK
Baby survives fall
A newborn tossed down a Brooklyn housing project’s trash chute survived the eight-story fall because he landed on a pile of garbage and the compactor was jammed, investigators said Monday.
A maintenance worker heard a baby’s cries coming from the trash compactor in the Walt Whitman Houses on Sunday morning. The boy was taken to Brooklyn Hospital, where he remained in stable condition, said Jerry Schmetterer, spokesman for the Brooklyn District Attorney’s office. He said the baby did not appear to have been injured in the fall.
Laquasia Wright, 18, was arrested on charges of attempted murder and endangering the welfare of a child. Police said it appeared Wright had given birth shortly before tossing the baby.
— Associated Press
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