The latest thing that can "cure" autism, courtesy of Pete Evans' Facebook fans.

Author of the Australian Autism Handbook, Benison O’Reilly, is concerned about a post endorsed by Pete Evans’ paleo Facebook page claiming that a “faecal” transplant has cured autism.

Years ago, I took my youngest son, then two, to see his favourite band, The Wiggles. At the time he was being treated for speech delay. While the other children sat and sang, I almost had to lasso him to the chair. We were reprimanded constantly by the usher for leaving our seats. Afterward he snatched a packet of Smarties from the snack bar. In desperation I bought them. On the train home, the Smarties scattered across the filthy floor and he lashed out when I wouldn’t let him eat them.

I realised that day something was very wrong with my beautiful little boy. A few months later he was diagnosed with autism.

At the time a radical new diet was being touted as a cure for my son’s condition. The gluten-free, casein-free (GFCF) diet involved eliminating gluten and dairy foods from your child’s diet. The theory was that these foods were broken down into proteins which crossed from ‘leaky’ intestines into the brain, mimicking the effects of opium-based drugs like morphine and heroin. In essence, turning your child with autism into spaced-out druggie. As a scientist this sounded too simplistic to me, and as a mother it made no sense at all. If my hyperactive, whirling dervish of a son was on drugs it would surely have been speed or cocaine.

I chose the traditional treatment route, early intervention. Originally diagnosed as severely developmentally-delayed, my son is now holding his own in mainstream high school. However, most people I knew attempted the GFCF diet with their child. A few reported positive effects; more abandoned it when they found it may no difference to their child’s progress. In subsequent scientific studies it’s failed to live up to the hype, but remains a popular therapy for autism and every now and again is resurrected as an autism ‘cure’ on tabloid TV.

Of course, the GFCF diet has much in common with the paleo way of eating so it’s no surprise that Pete Evans has linked up with the MINDD Foundation, group that espouses dietary and alternative treatments for autism. On Evans’ Facebook page this week a woman called Karen*, who calls herself an integrative nutritionist, popped up:

Dear Pete,
From one Parent to another, and of course one who is passionate about the health of our children to another I implore you to read on.
I’m sure as you have travelled the country you have found so many wonderful like minded people on a mission to change their lives and spread the word.
I am concerned though that the message is still yet to reach far enough. There are children here in South Australia with diagnosis of Autism, ADHD etc that continue to be medicated and fed a nutrient deficient diet. I am a PE teacher and integrative nutritionist and I see first hand the food that kids have in their lunch boxes everyday. I almost cry seeing the lollies, chocolates and packaged foods that these poor undernourished bodies eat.
I know the joy of real food and especially fermented food all to well. My son who was diagnosed with Autism at the age of 3 was given the gravest prognosis. We were told he would be nonverbal, wont meet normal milestones, the list went on. Our hearts were broken. But I knew in my heart that he was a sick boy and rather than labelling him with a diagnosis that really is only a list of symptoms we set out to get to the root cause.
Turns out our boy was riddled with pathogens (even in his brain) which were dictating his autistic symptoms. Instead of traditional therapies we chose to look at diet and environmental triggers. We started the gaps diet, changed our whole way of life, eliminated toxins and even moved to a beautiful seaside town for more fresh air. Our boy came back. The more liver he ate and the more kefir he consumed the stronger, happier and engaged he became. Our journey has even taken us to Canada where my son had a Faecal Microbial transplant. We joined a research team and he is one of very few kids to have this procedure done. The result was a miracle. With new bacteria in his gut he awoke the day after the transplant and spoke for the first time. Now he wont stop!!
Had we not radically changed our lives and taken many leaps of faith and followed our belief that there is more to Autism than a bunch of symptoms we would still be in a very dark place with a vacant child.
I am presenting at an Autism conference this month on Bio Medical interventions. This is a great opportunity to spread the word but this is only a start. I would like to start a real movement in Australia. In our schools, in our regulatory bodies and of course more importantly in the homes of all the families.

Pete wisely kept quiet this time, after getting into hot water with his earlier autism pronouncements. However, the post attracted the attention of other media, as any so-called miracle cure for autism does. People are always looking for easy answers to complex problems.

Aside from the ‘ick’ factor, the poo transplant was the most mainstream of Karen’s pronouncements. Researchers are looking into faecal microbiota transplants (FMT) as a treatment for autism. That said, it’s extremely experimental: ‘this approach is still in need of refinement, particularly in understanding the type of transplant, the delivery system to use, dosage, and duration of treatment as well as the need for pretreatment use of antibiotics and bowel-cleansing regimes.’

However, as a scientist I must ask Karen a few questions:

1. How do you know that your child’s brain was riddled with pathogens? Did he have a brain biopsy? Otherwise this is just a theory.

2. If autism is just a bunch of symptoms, how can you be so sure you’ve hit on the cause? Is it wise to reject traditional therapies for your son, when we have scientific evidence they can help?

3. If autism is so related to diet, how do you explain this recent study which found the IQ and behaviour of picky eaters with autism was no different to healthy eaters?

After a year of ‘traditional therapy’, I took my son see the Wiggles again. As we danced together to Hot Potato, he reminded me of the earlier concert and how “the man made me stay in my seat.” So he knew exactly what was going on that first dreadful day; he just lacked the words to tell me. So much for being ‘a vacant child’.

So Karen, I too, am interested, in autism research around FMT, but your son looks very young so I will reserve judgement on exactly how cured he is. Report back in a few years, please. Also, if speech is a sign of an autism cure, I wish you’d inform the many parents of children with Asperger’s who frequently complain that their child never shuts up!

But please never speak of people with autism so disrespectfully again. They may think differently to us but that does not mean they are vacant shells. When your son grows up he will not thank you.

* Name has been changed. 

Editor’s note: Karen* has been in contact with Mamamia and wanted to clarify that her son’s faecal transplant was undertaken to manage a a Clostridium Difficile bowel infection that caused terrible diarrhoea in her son. This condition was not mentioned in her original post on Pete Evans’ Facebook page.

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Benison O’Reilly is co-author of The Australian Autism Handbook. You can buy her book here.