"The integration of the autistic child requires heavy care"

Le Matin: The autistic child lives in a world apart. Can we know how many children suffer from this disease in Morocco in general and in Fes in particular?Afaf Amarti:

There are no official statistics in Morocco concerning the number of autistic children or the incidence of this disease. According to international estimates, 1/100 to 1/150 children are affected by this disease, which means that there are probably several tens of thousands of autistic children in Morocco. In Fes, there are probably several hundred children affected by autism.

All international studies have made it possible to note that keeping autistic children in a natural environment, by optimising their environment as much as possible to allow them to learn, is the best way to take care of them. However, it would be a mistake to believe that the integration of the autistic child will happen spontaneously. It requires heavy and continuous care from parents and support staff. Many educational methods are in vogue in the world, in particular behavioural methods.

Scientific research has made it possible to confirm that it is a pathology linked to genetic anomalies that hinder the normal development of the nervous system. These anomalies are rarely hereditary and occur accidentally during intrauterine development. Furthermore, many studies have tried to confirm the role of environmental factors in the occurrence of autism, but no factor has been formally incriminated.

Efforts have been made, but they are totally insufficient. Associations like ours can, in partnership with the delegations of the Ministry of National Education, have at their disposal special classes within public primary schools, but the integration of autistic children with a life assistant in normal classes is still difficult. Furthermore, no effort has been made concerning the production of adequate programmes or teaching tools. The learning mode of autistic children is essentially visual and our association, for example, produces itself all the teaching materials that children need in a specialised class, which requires a lot of energy and means from all the stakeholders.

There is no specialised school. Moreover, it is preferable to keep autistic children integrated in normal schools, even partially. The Miroir association manages 4 specialised classes within 2 primary schools in Fes.

This is a big problem in our country, there is no specific training for specialised educators and the associations take charge of all the costs inherent to this training by most often inviting foreign trainers.

The Miroir association has been working since 2004 for the support of families of autistic children and their care. The number of children admitted to the association has multiplied by 10 in 9 years and we currently ensure the care of nearly 60 children. The difficulty of care concerning autism lies in the need to integrate families into the educational process. Each child is particular in their difficulties and capacities, so that individualised programmes are established for each child and must take into consideration the priorities of learning in terms of autonomy, socialisation, communication, and cognitive acquisitions. For all the children of the association, coordination is also done with the teams of neuropediatrics, pedopsychiatry, and genetics that take care of them. The association also organises charitable actions to have funds in order to take charge of almost all the costs for destitute children and ensure the teaching material for classes and workshops. Our flagship project is to constitute, in partnership with professionals, a specialised network for the care of autistic children in Fes which will also be able to benefit other associations.

The monthly costs of care are indeed about 2,000 to 2,500 DH, because for optimal learning, each child has a life assistant who takes care of them exclusively, let us add to that the costs of support therapies: re-education, psychomotricity, neurofunctional reorganisation, school transport, registration fees in private schools for integrated children, etc. The association takes charge of many destitute children or organises sponsorship and donation actions for this purpose. It also takes charge of all the educational material: pictograms, audiovisual, neurofunctional reorganisation, educational games, sports equipment, classroom equipment...

Provider / Source : Propos Recueillis Par Rachida Bami, Le Matin