Disability Reform Minister Jenny Macklin: Declared the NDIS will cover "most" people with autism. Photo: Alex Ellinghausen
The national disability insurance scheme will cover ''most'' people with autism and could pay the full cost of early intervention programs, Disability Reform Minister Jenny Macklin has declared in the latest clue as to what the $22 billion-a-year scheme will cover.
Autism affects about one in 100 children in Australia. Diagnoses of the condition more than doubled in Australia from 2003 to 2009 - 64,000 Australians have autism, latest figures show.
There were fears that the condition would be excluded from the scheme, or that the support provided by DisabilityCare Australia would be no greater than the current program, which funds only a fraction of the cost of the most effective therapies.
Opposition Leader Tony Abbott has demanded the government clarify whether autism will be included in the scheme, but ministers have only pointed to the legislation passed in March, which set broad parameters.
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But in an interview with Fairfax Media, Ms Macklin confirmed the scheme would support ''most'' people with autism but stressed the agency would work with people to identify their individual needs.
''People are very different, they have very different levels of disability, and very different levels of ability, so what they need from DisabilityCare Australia will really vary.''
The government's Helping Children with Autism program provides families of children with autism $6000 a year for two years. About 19,000 children used that funding in the program's first five years. But the annual cost of applied behaviour analysis therapy - the only specific early intervention the federal Families Department rates as effective based on ''established research evidence'' - is $40,000.
That research shows about 50 per cent of children with autism are able to reach a normal educational outcome by age six.
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Scheme will cover cost of autism treatment