In many South Asian American families, a child’s autism diagnosis is a secret

By Ritu GoelJune 15, 2026

Goel is a double board-certified child, adolescent, and adult psychiatrist and founder of MindClaire PC.

The CDC’s latest data show autism prevalence is 1 in 31 children in the United States. That is 16% higher than the previous estimate in 2020. It is the kind of number that should change how health systems allocate resources, how pediatricians screen, and how schools plan.

But there is a population this number barely touches: South Asian American families, where an autism diagnosis is still, in many homes, a secret.

I know this because I have lived on both sides of it. I am a child and adolescent psychiatrist. I am also a South Asian woman and a mother. For years, I worked with families navigating complex childhood diagnoses at institutions like Johns Hopkins, Kennedy Krieger, and Kaiser Permanente. The pattern I saw in the clinic is the same one the research now confirms: South Asian children are diagnosed with developmental disabilities later than white peers. (On average, minority children are diagnosed roughly a year to a year and a half later than their white peers.) Their families access fewer services. And the primary barrier is not language, insurance, or geography. It is stigma.