An old video of Avi Reichenberg: http://www.mefeedia.com/entry/1222262/


Autism and Older Dads


One cause might be mutations in the sperm as men age, Reichenberg said. "Those mutations might be accumulating with age and therefore transmitted from the father to the child," he said. "Another possibility is that mechanisms that the body has to protect itself from mutations are not working that well with age."

It might also be that an improper or defective gene is being activated, Reichenberg noted. These mechanisms operating alone or in concert may be the reason for the association of older parental age and autism, he said.

In their study, Reichenberg's team collected data on the age of the fathers of 318,506 people born during the 1980s in Israel. The age of the mother was known for 132,271 of these people as well. Among these individuals, all the men and three-fourths of the women were assessed by the draft board at age 17 for any psychiatric disorders.

Among those whose father's age was the only one known, 208 children had a diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder, as did 110 in the group where the age of both parents was known, the researchers found.

When the researchers compared the parents' age when they had their child to the cases of autism among the children, they found 34 cases among 60,654 kids born to parents aged 15 to 29 years old, 62 cases among 67,211 kids born to parents aged 30 to 39 years old, 13 cases among 4,106 kids born to parents aged 40 to 49 years old and one case among 190 kids born to parents older than 50.

Reichenberg's group found the advancing age of fathers was associated with increased risk of autism. In fact, the odds of a child having autism spectrum disorder were nearly six times greater for children of men aged 40 and older, compared with men aged 29 years and younger. The older age of mothers was not associated with the risk for autism.

"This phenomenon of older fathers having autistic kids should be explored further, because it might give us a clue about the genetic mechanism that contributes to the development of autism," Reichenberg said.