1 minute read
YEREVAN, AUGUST 1, ARMENPRESS:
The genetic factors that underpin autism have been much studied, but when Joachim Hallmayer of Stanford University, California, and colleagues analyzed identical and non-identical twins to tease out the genetic and environmental influences on autism, they found that 55 per cent of the variation in autism risk was down to shared environmental factors - genes accounted for 37 per cent (Archives of General Psychiatry).
Doctors On-line reports that in the same journal, Lisa Croen at the Kaiser Permanente Division of Research in Oakland, California, claimed that children are twice as likely to develop autism if their mother took antidepressants in the 12 months before giving birth. The team cautions, however, that a mother and fetus may be at risk if the mother's mental health disorder goes untreated.