World Autism Awareness Day: Hong Kong Needs To Do More For Autistic Children

Faride Shroff has spent 30 years working with children with special educational needs. On World Autism Awareness Day on 2 April, she speaks candidly about hidden costs, cultural blind spots and more.

Unconscious bias is everywhere — and most of us don’t even notice it. For autistic children, this quiet, persistent misunderstanding plays out daily: in classrooms and public places. At its root is something deeply human — the tendency to feel most at ease around people who think and communicate the way we do.

For World Autism Awareness Day on Thursday, 2 April 2026, we spoke to Faride Shroff, founder of SENsational Foundation Hong Kong, who has spent 30 years making it her mission to dismantle this bias.

“Every single person has a different fingerprint,” says Faride. “We are different — every person has their own individual skills and mindset — and we need to embrace that in totality. It is not by choice that someone has autism. All that society can and should do is accept them, with their differences.”

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Everyday Obstacles That Get Overlooked

There are the daily, granular obstacles that autistic children face simply moving through the world. Bullying in schools remains one of the most persistent. “Without them knowing, they are excluded from games, called different names. Sometimes it may not be the words but just the looks they are given by people who don’t understand that they are different,” says Faride.

These challenges follow children into adulthood. Difficulty maintaining eye contact — common among autistic people — is routinely misread as disinterest or disrespect. “Others will say, ‘Oh, they’re not even listening to me’ or ‘They’re not showing me interest, so I don’t want to employ them’,” Faride explains.

She often uses the term “differently abled”, though she acknowledges language is evolving — many autistic people today prefer to own the word autistic with pride. What matters more than terminology, she argues, is intent. “Society needs to give them a sense of belonging and say that there should never be any stigma attached to disabilities.”

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The Costs Nobody Talks About

When we discuss the challenges facing families of autistic children, the conversation tends to stay on familiar grounds: school policies, therapy waiting lists, awareness campaigns. What gets far less attention are the quieter, cumulative costs that wear families down over years.

“Other than the known costs of schooling and therapies — occupational therapy, speech therapy, physiotherapy, regular assessments — parents are constantly under stress themselves. So there are medical issues for parents too. These are costs which people don’t understand,” says Faride.

The sacrifices are just as invisible. Sometimes working parents need to give up opportunities at the workplace to support their children. “They need understanding from their employer that there are times when the child needs immediate support and they need to be allowed to leave work at that particular time,” says Faride. But unfortunately, so far, that understanding or infrastructural support is not provided by most Hong Kong employers.

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Where Hong Kong Is Still Falling Short

Hong Kong schools now have more SEN resources, public awareness has grown and Faride welcomes the change. But she is clear-eyed about what remains. “The bias still exists and it is very deep-rooted in the culture. It will take time.”

Progress also needs to be honest. There is a meaningful difference, she argues, between institutions that have genuinely rethought how they include autistic people and those that have simply added a checkbox to their diversity policy.

The most practical accommodation she advocates for costs nothing at all: time. “If I take an Uber to Hong Kong Island and another person takes the train, they may get there a different way but they will reach the same destination ultimately. It’s just a different route.” The same applies in conversation. “When talking to someone autistic, they may take a little longer to respond because they are processing the question. Giving them that extra space and time is such an important part of making them part of our society.”

On this World Autism Awareness Day, the way forward is clear. Awareness is not enough if it isn’t followed by genuine acceptance, be it in classrooms or workplaces.