Deputy seeks support for autistic adults

Families with autistic adult children in China have great difficulties in taking care of them and need government help, a deputy to the National People’s Congress from Shanghai said on Thursday.

Liu Xiaobing said autistic adults can’t be admitted to schools of compulsory education, nor were there nursery institutions eligible to accept them.

There was a “severe shortage” of social services and protection of this category of people who had not yet had laws dedicated to them.

“During my investigation, families with autistic children called for the government to cover a part of the service costs at day care centers for autistic people, but there is a lack of competent workers at such centers because autistic people need very professional and careful caretakers,” he said.

Liu called for a census of adult autistic children and care centers to be established for them near their homes.

It was estimated there are over 8 million autistic people over 14 years old in China, with about 230,000 in Shanghai.

Liu is dean of the School of Public Economics and Administration of Shanghai University of Finance and Economics and a member of the Revolutionary Committee of the Chinese Kuomintang, a non-Communist party in China.