Airline lacks care for those in special need

Wang Ming instructs an autistic 3-year-old in Lanzhou, Gansu province. Wang must repeat the same word as many as 1,000 times before the child can pronounce it. Cao Zhizheng / for China Daily

AN AIRLINE rejected a father taking his 13-year-old autistic son onto a plane on Tuesday on the grounds that "the child's behavior was weird". Beijing Youth Daily commented on Thursday that the airline's dogmatic refusal to allow the juvenile passenger to board the aircraft exposes a lack of understanding of autism.

Autism is a developmental disorder characterized by impaired social interaction and verbal and non-verbal communication, and restricted and repetitive behavior.

Children with autism, when they are forced to do something they don't want to do, will become aggressive to different degrees.

But these children are controllable if their guardians can take good care of them. China has more than 2 million children under 14 suffering from autism. Most of them live a normal life, because of their families' thoughtful care. And some autistic children are gifted in certain areas, such as art and music.

The airline does have the legal right to refuse to allow a passenger to fly. But the airline's rude refusal to allow the boy to board the plane saved its ground staff and cabin crew the little extra effort required to take care of the child.

Two years ago, the ice bucket challenge in many countries awakened the public to know about, and raised money for patients of ALS, or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, a progressive neurodegenerative disease that affects nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord.

Today, the airport incident should remind the government and social organizations to take actions to raise the society's awareness and deepen people's understanding of autism.