Cost of autism in Britain

Autism is important because it condemns children to a lifetime of difference. Right now we don’t know the cause, nor do we have any effective remedies. That will change, and at some point decisions will need to be made not only about the effectiveness of any preventive measures or treatments, but also about their cost-effectiveness.

That entails knowing something about the costs of autism. A new study from the Institute of Psychiatry gives us an informed insight [1]. The bottom line is that the cost of autism in Britain is of the order of £1 billion.

Study

The authors performed systematic searches of literature, of various electronic databases, and contacted authors and experts to assemble the package of information on the disorder, its impact on individuals, families and society, and on the costs involved. At each stage of the cost calculations the evidence is outlined in detail.

Results

The main results are shown in Table 1. For a person with autism and additional learning disability the average lifetime costs was £2.94 million. For someone with higher functioning autism the average lifetime cost is £785,000. With an assumed prevalence of autism of five per 10,000 and with 75% of persons with autism having additional learning disability, the annual social cost of autism in Britain is £957 million.

Table 1: Costs of autism in Britain for individuals (lifetime) and society (annual)

Cost category	Individual with learning disability (£)	Individual with higher functioning autism (£)	UK total (£ million)
Hospital services	26,600	30,700	11
Medication	3,400	8,300	2
Other health and social servcies	71,600	31,200	25
Living support	2,134,000	312,500	669
Voluntary support	18,800	----	5
Special education	179,100	108,300	64
Sheltered work	16,200	67,800	12
Day activities	422,400	74,500	134
Lost productivity	---	137,100	14
Family members time	39,600	14,400	13
Family expenses	30,800	---	9
Total	2,940,500	784,800	957

Comment

This study will be particularly useful in assessing the cost effectiveness of prevention strategies or treatment strategies in future. In the meantime it is a wake up call about the seriousness of autism in financial as well as human terms.

References:

K Järbrink & M Knapp. The economic impact of autism in Britain. Autism 2001 5: 7-22.