The Ontario government refuses to publicly disclose its progress in registering children for core autism treatments, after the recent update showed it is far from its target. Merrilee Fullerton, Minister of Children, Community and Social Services, said the government would enroll 8,000 children into core clinical services by the end of fall, but as of last month, that number was about 888 only, with government officials at the time saying that the movement was slow initially due to the startup of a new intake process, and said these numbers would begin to grow significantly over time. But Fullerton's office refused to provide an update to these numbers in response to a request this month from The Canadian Press, with spokesperson Patrick Bisset saying in a statement: “Given that thousands of invitations are available to families, and at different stages, providing these numbers no longer reflects the launch of Ontario’s autism program as it did before.” Bisset also did not respond to follow-up inquiries requesting further clarification or if that means these numbers will be provided again.

NDP critic Monique Taylor described this as "shameful," saying: "This is not transparency and this is not what families need or want, they have such a program failure happening and they have such a startup failure that they are now hiding."

Seven-year-old Alina Cameron's daughter had been on the waiting list for government-funded therapy since October 30, 2017, saying that seeing enrollment progress is not just a matter of transparency but a matter of financial planning, and while her family has been able to piece together some therapy and pay cash for part-time therapy, the cost of therapy annually was exorbitant, estimated at $93,000. Cameron pays nearly $900 a week for part-time services and doesn't know how long she should plan to cover that, or if she needs to reduce her daughter's therapy, or perhaps make a new plan with the bank.

In the same context, as of last month, the government had sent about 6,300 letters to families inviting them to register in the new intake portal. Another 5,000 letters were scheduled to be sent by the end of August, but so far, the response has been less than officials expected, who said fewer than 1,700 families had responded to the letter and registered in the new system by mid-August. The next step in the new process is to send invitations to families to participate in an interview to determine the level of need of their children, and nearly 300 of them have participated. Officials stated last month that among these 300 children, 30 have been registered in core clinical services since late July, as they were going by order of registration, meaning they started with children who first sought therapy since 2015. Officials added that some likely no longer needed the service now.