The Ministry of Health website states that as of 2008, there are 3,642,700 residents in Singapore, of whom 670,257 (or 18.4% of the resident population) are children. As the global prevalence of Autism is 0.6%, this means that are approximately 4,022 autistic children in Singapore. About 90% (or 3,620) of these 4,022 are low-functioning and the other 10% (or 402) are high-functioning.
The government’s stand on autistic children is that autistic children should go to Special Education schools. However, all of the sixteen special education schools in Singapore which cater to autistic children only cater to low-functioning autists. High-functioning autists are told to attend mainstream schools. Mainstream schools cater only to normal children, and are not suitable for high-functioning autists. Neither special education schools nor mainstream schools are suitable for high-functioning autists.
And yet, the government has not thus far built a school for high-functioning autistic children. It is not as if this part of the population is so small that it would not be viable to build and operate a school for them; they number approximately four hundred. That’s enough to form atleast fifteen classes! The parents of high-functioning autistic children pay the same taxes as both the parents of low-functioning autists and the parents of normal children; so why are high-functioning autistic children not getting a school of their own?
And while low-functioning autists are automatically exempted from National Service, there is no such provision for high-functioning autists. Singapore is perhaps the only modern nation where (high-functioning) autists are legally forced to serve in the military! Is Singapore’s military so weak and desperate that they must make autists serve National Service?
72.9% (or 2,655,528 persons) of the resident population is between the ages of 15 and 64 years; which means that approximately 15,933 of these persons are autistic. It would be quite difficult for autists (especially low-functioning autists) to obtain and retain employment. What is the government of Singapore doing to take care of these people? Nothing – the government is not even taking care of the destitutes in Singapore, let alone autistic persons. And I wonder how of Singapore’s destitute are autistic? It must be difficult enough for a normal person to be destitute, let alone an autist. But wait, according to Kishore Mahbubani, there are no vagrants in Singapore! Maybe there are no autists in Singapore either!
The Government of Singapore has over $100 billion (that’s $100,000,000,000.00) in the country’s reserves, but cannot afford to properly provide for its autists. What are the reserves for? According to the PAP, they are for a rainy day. If the day when vagrants are starving on the streets, and high-functioning autists have no chance of getting a formal education, isn’t a rainy day, then I don’t know what is!
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