Autism delay is a betrayal of Jo

Prophecy of late MP’s warning

IT WAS, prophetically, the late Jo Cox MP who first exposed the unforgivable length of time that it now takes to diagnose youngsters suffering from traits of autism. “Here is a crisis now so acute that some desperate parents are paying for help that by right they should be able to access on the NHS,” she told Parliament in March.

Then Mrs Cox was aghast that it was taking more than three years for children to receive specific support to help them, and their families, with behavioural challenges. Nearly six months later, it gives us no pleasure to reveal how local families are still waiting up to 1,053 days – the best part of three years – for a basic assessment, never mind a programme of care.

To put this in context, official guidelines suggest the wait should be no more than three months. As the number of people on the waiting list grows by the week, no wonder families are in despair over an apparent lack of urgency; for example health chiefs in Leeds say they will be “working more efficiently” in a bid to meet national targets by next March.

Try telling that to people like Vicki Reedman who has already been waiting since June 2015 for her sixyear-old son Lucas, who has awareness issues, to be properly assessed. Such families are enduring a living nightmare because the NHS is not only bereft of the resources, but basic empathy and humanity towards those requiring its support and expertise.

Perhaps those concerned should re-acquaint themselves with Mrs Cox’s heart-rending speech when she disclosed how the diagnosis of Asperger Syndrome, and subsequent support, had changed the life of a young man in her Batley & Spen constituency: “He said he wished he had been diagnosed sooner because, in his words “I always knew I was different, now I know why’.” Let’s hope that there are MPs prepared to take up the cudgels on behalf of their much missed colleague – and stand up for some of the most vulnerable members of society.