Comments made at the IACC Meeting, Apr 30, 2010 The Strategic Plan needs to include something on birth injury, and how trauma and anoxia affect the brain.  How safe are obstetric and neonatal procedures? Vaccinations are highly visible treatments, and rightfully questioned as a cause of harm, but what about less visible interventions, or interventions we have been taught to take for granted? It has been pointed out to me that clamping the umbilical cord at birth may be very dangerous.  Effects of clamping the cord are unpredictable.  The newborn lungs cannot function until blood supply to the alveoli is established.  This blood should come from the placenta, but if transfer of blood from the placenta is blocked, blood for the lungs will be drained from other organs. If blood is drained from the brain, a well-defined pattern of ischemic injury will occur in nuclei of the auditory pathway.  The Apgar score may be a perfect 10, but the baby left with auditory system impairment severe enough to prevent normal language development. --- Developmental language disorder also needs a higher priority in the Strategic Plan.  The unusual hypo- and hyper-sensitive signs of auditory system dysfunction likewise need to be made a higher priority for research. --- I have cited the evidence for auditory system vulnerability (to all of autism’s many causes) in my written comments – and online at www.conradsimon.org. --- Also in my written comments and online, I have urged that mandatory long-term care insurance be required for all citizens, form birth, to cover the huge cost of life-span care.  Requiring long-term care insurance would also involve actuarial scientists in research on why the prevalence of autism has been increasing.   Eileen Nicole Simon                                        11 Hayes Avenue, Lexington, MA 02420-3521 (781) 862-5326 eileen@conradsimon.org Written comments submitted