In his recent address to both houses of Congress, President Trump brought new awareness to the number of children diagnosed with autism.  “Our goal is to get toxins out of our environment, poisons out of our food supply, and keep our children healthy and strong,” he said in his speech to Congress last week. “As an example, not long ago, and you can’t even believe these numbers, 1 in 10,000 children have autism. One in 10,000. And now it’s 1 in 36. There’s something wrong. One in 36.”

That’s an alarming increase and bears further attention. But understanding the cause of this increase is paramount to solving the problem.

Allysia Finley, writing in The Wall Street Journal, believes the president is going about it all wrong. She says, “Left-wing environmentalists have long exploited parents’ anxieties by stoking fears about “environmental toxins” harming their kids. Now President Trump is taking up their cause. Something is wrong, and it’s the information that has been fed to him by “radical left lunatics” like Robert F. Kennedy Jr.—the label Mr. Trump applied less than a year ago to the man who is now his health and human services secretary.”

The onus for this increase has been placed on vaccines in the past, although there is no scientific evidence to support these claims. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reportedly plans to conduct a study of vaccines and autism despite countless failed attempts to find a causal link. Many toddlers show traits associated with autism spectrum disorder, such as repetitive behaviors or sensitivity to noise, around the same age as they get vaccinated. This doesn’t mean vaccines cause autism, any more than higher CO2 emissions cause Category 5 hurricanes.

Finley believes the main causes of increasing autism rates are heightened public attention and broader diagnostic criteria, which have encouraged more diagnoses of children and young adults who wouldn’t have been labeled autistic decades ago. Bill Gates notes in his new memoir, “Source Code,” that if he were a kid today he would likely be diagnosed on the autism spectrum because he was hyperfocused and struggled to read social cues. Kids may get diagnosed as on the spectrum if they are late to start talking or insist on following routines like sticking to a set bedtime. Suggesting that autism is a result of “toxins” stigmatizes people who happen to be wired differently.

The 1-in-10,000 statistic the president cited derives from a 1970 review of Wisconsin kids in the 1960s. In those days, only those who struggled to function were diagnosed. Most needed special education and accommodations, which they often didn’t get in public schools because it was expensive.

In 1973 Congress passed a law requiring schools that receive federal funds to make special accommodations for students diagnosed with disabilities, including autism. Two years later, Congress required states to identify such kids proactively and gave schools more money for each student who was diagnosed as disabled.

Whenever the government throws money at a program, you can be sure there will soon be more of that. The predictable result: a sharp uptick in autism diagnoses during the 1980s and 1990s as schools chased federal dollars. Some of these students needed special education, but many didn’t. Congress changed the funding formula in the late 1990s because many schools were diagnosing unimpaired children with cognitive disabilities to get more federal money.

Many states also give schools more money when their students are diagnosed on the spectrum. A 2022 study found states that do so had more diagnoses. According to government data, nearly 1 in 6 public-school students in 2022 were diagnosed as having a disability. But do they really? A study last autumn found that prevalence of autism more than tripled among children and young adults between 2011 and 2022. Don’t blame vaccines. Autism diagnoses increased most sharply in 2021 and 2022 even as MMR vaccination rates among kids fell.

Incentives can be powerful. Students diagnosed with autism, ADHD and learning disabilities typically get 50% more time to complete the ACT test. Some students may legitimately need such accommodations, but many are gaming the system.

An autism diagnosis can also yield more government benefits, including Supplemental Security Income. One study found that the prevalence of autism among young adults on Medicaid increased by about 50% between 2008 and 2012, which coincided with the economic downturn that left many out of work.

Finley concludes: “Jay Bhattacharya, Mr. Trump’s nominee to lead the National Institutes of Health, last week told the Senate that he was convinced that vaccines don’t cause autism, but that he would nonetheless “support a broad scientific agenda based on data to get an answer” to what does. By all means, study the genetic underpinnings. But please, Mr. President, don’t fuel public alarm.”

Clearly there is a need for further scientific study of the causes of autism and we should always be mindful of unintended consequences when we incentivize bad behavior. I look forward to learning more about this issue.

I’ll let you in on a very personal secret – my wife wears socks to bed. Her feet get cold so on most nights she chooses to wear socks. Me, I prefer letting the air breathe around my feet. However, my wife usually falls asleep faster than I do.

Imagine my surprise when I picked up the newspaper and read an article on how wearing socks can help you fall asleep faster! Zena le Roux, writing in The Epoch Times, tells us, “Grandma was onto something when she told you to wear socks to bed. In Nordic countries, staying cozy before sleep is part of the tradition of “hygge,” which embraces warmth and comfort as essential for restful nights. Beyond just feeling snug, warming your feet plays a vital role in sleep. It helps your body cool down just the right way, signaling that it’s time to rest.”

When the body is exposed to warmth—through a bath, foot soak, or warm socks—it activates cooling mechanisms. Heat causes blood vessels to expand (vasodilate), boosting blood flow to the skin’s surface. This process releases heat from the body, effectively lowering core temperature. As blood moves toward the skin, excess heat transfers out of the body, promoting a cooler internal temperature and aiding sleep.

The body’s sleep–wake cycle is closely linked to core temperature changes. During the day, body temperature peaks in the late afternoon and early evening. At night, it gradually drops, signaling the body to prepare for sleep.

Dr. Alison Bentley, who has more than 30 years of experience treating sleep disorders, told The Epoch Times that the sleep hormone melatonin also helps lower body temperature. As melatonin is released, body temperature naturally decreases, setting the stage for deep sleep.

Wearing socks in bed is an easy and effective way to activate the cooling mechanism. A 2018 study showed that this simple strategy can improve sleep quality, leading to fewer awakenings, longer sleep duration, and quicker sleep onset. On average, those who wore socks during a seven-hour sleep period fell asleep 7.5 minutes faster, had 7.5 fewer awakenings, and gained 32 extra minutes of sleep. Sleep efficiency also increased by 7.6 percent in sock wearers.

Beyond vasodilation, socks may also influence the hypothalamus, the brain’s temperature control center. Certain neurons (brain cells) in this area respond to warmth by becoming more active, which promotes sleep. Their activity increases at sleep onset and during deep sleep but decreases upon waking. Therefore, keeping your feet warm may help these neurons function optimally, improving sleep quality.

Your bedroom’s temperature also affects sleep quality. According to Giles Watkins, a sleep coach and author of “Positive Sleep,” the ideal room temperature for sleep is about 64 degrees Fahrenheit. (I can’t imagine turning my A/C on high enough to achieve 64 degress, but I do agree cooler is better.)=

A cool sleeping environment supports deeper, more restorative sleep. Watkins explained that keeping the room cooler aligns with the body’s natural cooling process, making falling and staying asleep easier. In contrast, a bedroom that’s too warm can disrupt the cooling process, leading to difficulty falling asleep and restless nights. Keeping your room comfortably cool can create the optimal conditions for rest.

Looking to fine-tune your sleep environment? Try these temperature-regulating strategies:

• Optimize your bedroom to prevent heat buildup during the day.
• Lower the thermostat before bed.
• Choose cooler bedding materials.

The body cools down about two hours before sleep, so lowering the thermostat complements this natural temperature drop, according to Watkins. If you’re looking to cut heating costs, cracking a window may help. Additionally, choose cotton or wool bed socks (they’re breathable and comfortable), and avoid synthetic fabrics that trap heat. You can also add calming essential oils such as lavender and chamomile to your foot bath for extra relaxation.

I’m ready to give socks a try, even if I have to give my wife credit for the idea first. What have I got to lose but more sleep?

If you watch television much, like most people, you’ve probably seen the latest ads about the “Biden Pill Penalty.” The ads are calling on Republicans and President Trump to fix the penalty. But what is it?

This all concerns the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) of 2022, a misnamed bill if there ever was one. It certainly did not reduce inflation, but it did do a lot of harm for seniors on Medicare.

The issue is price controls. I wrote about it in a previous post on 8/19/24 called Price Controls Means Fewer Drugs and Groceries. Here’s what I said about them then:

“It makes good political sense to tell seniors you’re going to lower the price of their prescription drugs. What you won’t tell them, however, is this same move will reduce the development of new medicines.”

The editors of The Wall Street Journal said this: “The IRA let Medicare “negotiate” prices for 10 to 20 drugs a year and a total of 60 by 2029. Negotiate is a euphemism for extortion: Drug makers that don’t participate or reject the government’s price face a daily excise tax that starts at 186% and climbs to 1,900% of a drug’s daily revenue.”

The law also requires manufacturers to pay the government rebates on medicines sold to Medicare if they raise prices more than the rate of inflation, and puts them on the hook for more of the entitlement’s Part D costs. Democrats used the resulting estimated “savings” of some $160 billion to pay for the green new deal.

WSJ says, “But subsidized solar panels won’t help if you get sick. The inevitable, albeit invisible, result of Democrats’ raid on pharmaceutical companies will be fewer new medicines.”

Thus, the term, “The Biden Pill Penalty.” The penalty is fewer new medicines for seniors whose declining health means they need those new medicines more than anyone.

Roche CEO Thomas Schinecker said last summer that “we have decided that we are not going to do certain trials, or that we are not going to do a merger or acquisition or licensing [deal] because it is becoming financially not viable.” Astra-Zeneca also warned that it might delay launching some cancer medicines because of the IRA.

Some 90% of drug candidates fail in clinical trials, and manufacturers sometimes never recoup their investment on even those that are approved. They use profits from their few commercial successes to finance research and development into new medicines and to compensate investors. The IRA threatens this risk-reward model.

Here is what the WSJ editors have to say about that:

“Fixing prices is a recipe for shortages, as controls would discourage grocery suppliers. Voilà, empty store shelves. Price controls have led to shortages everywhere they’ve been tried, from Moscow to Caracas. The last American President to impose wage and price controls was Richard Nixon in the early 1970s. He had to stage a humiliating retreat amid shortages and market dislocations, and prices immediately soared when controls were lifted.”

It’s time to undo the damage of the Biden Pill Penalty and get rid of price controls on prescription drugs. We need all the innovation possible to develop new drugs to keep us all living longer. Price controls only disincentivize the pharmaceutical companies from developing new drugs when we need them most.