Big splashy story on the front page of the Valley & State section the other day.

Autism therapy group says it cured 6 kids

Results from a Phoenix study of a behavior therapy designed to cure autism give hope to thousands of Arizona families and could revamp special education in the state’s public schools.

But the costly price tag could keep the treatment out of reach for many families. And the state’s budget crisis could mean implementation is years away at the school level.

The Center for Autism and Related Disorders says it has cured six of 14 autistic children who participated in a $5.4 million, state-funded study in the Phoenix area.

Emphasis added. We know nothing about autism, but this story doesn’t have anything close to the amount of information in it to allow someone to figure out what’s going on.

The story says that the treatment included “intensive behavior therapy” but never explains what that is. A few graphs later it’s defined again—as “a type of therapy called applied behavior analysis, known as ABA”—but it’s never explained what that entails, either.

Even further on we hear it can be “web-based.” Then we hear again that it’s “highly intense”—and can cost $200,000.

There’s very little in the story that would help a disinterested reader figure out the value of this program.

There’s mention of one child who was helped by the program, but the reporter didn’t talk to the girl involved. Instead, her parents merely say that she’s “recovered.”

The story also doesn’t explain CARD’s position in the sometimes contentious world of autism treatment, and doesn’t put this program into the context of other CARD programs or the spectrum of autism treatment generally.

And finally, the story ends on an amazing note. First, a director of the center gets to make an unchallenged paean to, unsurprisingly, the center’s work…:

Daniel Openden, the center’s vice president and clinical services director, said the CARD results are the latest to prove ABA-based therapy is the gold standard for autism treatment.

… and then, in the last lines of the story, undercuts the story’s entire premise and headline:

He sees autistic children make amazing progress, but he doesn’t say they are cured or recovered.

“Recovery can mean different things to different people, so the key is to understand how recovery is defined,” he said. “We see a range of outcomes in response to effective treatment, up to and including children who appear indistinguishable from their peers. But we’re not comfortable saying that these children no longer have autism.”