The provincial government’s recent decision to stop funding the $5 million early intensive behaviour intervention (EIBI) autism program and spread the money to other autism programs has struck a nerve.

Walnut Grove resident Susan Lee and her husband Matthew have two children diagnosed with autism. Their seven-year-old daughter, Macayla, is on the high-functioning end of the spectrum and was not in the early intervention program, but their four-year-old son Jaiden only got into the program in August. Lee said the news of the funding change was tough to take.

“I was horrified,” she said. “It was a nightmare. It still is.”

Lee said she suspected Jaiden had autism when he was between 16 and 18 months old.

“He was starting to speak, he got those first few words out and he regressed,” she said. “It was so hard because we’d been through it before.”

Jaiden was officially diagnosed with autism the day before his third birthday in July 2008. Lee said she researched the EIBI program before his official diagnosis and applied for it the day he was diagnosed.

She wasn’t expecting to get him into the program even a full year later, though.

“They had told me maybe 2010,” she said.

An opening came up this August, though, and Jaiden entered the program. Lee said she was thrilled when she heard there was a spot for him.

“This was almost like our huge hope for him,” she said.

That hope was soon rewarded. Through seven weeks in the program, Jaiden’s eye contact has improved, as has his engagement with his family and the behavioural interventionists. His crying has decreased, and his attention span has increased.

“It’s been unbelievable so far,” Lee said. “The leaps and bounds he’s made in just a few weeks have been amazing.”

Lee said one notable example of his improvement comes from part of the program where kids are seated at a table covered in toys.

“In the beginning, he’d just throw all the toys off the table and run away,” she said.

Lee said she’s heard similar stories from other families with children in the EIBI program, which features speech therapists, behavioral interventionists, physical therapists and others working together. Normally, autistic children have to see each specialist separately.

“It’s amazing because everyone’s working together, everyone’s on the same page,” she said. “You don’t get that anywhere else.

“I’ve heard people say ‘It saved my child’s life.’”

There are 70 B.C. children currently in the EIBI program, which costs $70,000 per child annually. Children and Family Development Minister and Langley MLA Mary Polak said the program will continue to run in six of the seven locations where it is currently offered, but it will no longer be fully funded. Instead, parents with autistic children under age six will receive $22,000 a year for treatment, up from the $20,000 they currently receive. Polak said this is a more equitable approach that will maximize care for all children with autism (see separate story). However, Lee doesn’t buy the government’s approach.

“They’re saying it’s about equity, but every child diagnosed with autism is eligible to be in this program, they just have to wait,” she said.

Lee said the $22,000 will only pay for minimal treatment, which would involve six to nine hours weekly with a behavioural interventionist and no speech therapy or physical therapy.

The costs of treatment may also go up thanks to the government’s introduction of a harmonized sales tax, as autism services are currently exempt from provincial sales tax and only subject to the federal goods and services sales tax. Lee said her family won’t be able to afford the EIBI program without government funding, so they’ll have to find other treatment options for Jaiden.

“We’ll have to pull him out for sure.”

Lee is an administrator in a Facebook group, “Reverse The EIBI/EAIP funding cuts!” that was formed to protest the cuts. By Wednesday, it had reached 672 members, many of whom have kids in the program. People looking for more information on the cuts can contact the group at bcautism@gmail.com.

Lee said she’d like the government to think about the people they’re affecting with the program cut.

“The families of children who have been through this program, the progress they’ve made, it is unbelievable,” she said. “I’d get them to take a look at these families they’re doing this to.”