An American Phenomenon...

The Widespread Psychiatric Drugging of Infants and Toddlers...




The United States has become the psychiatric drugging capital of the world for kids with children being medicated at a younger and younger age. Medicaid records in some states show infants less than a year old on drugs for mental disorders.

The use of powerful antipsychotics with privately insured children, aged 2 through 5 in the US, doubled between 1999 and 2007, according to a study of data on more than one million children with private health insurance in the January, 2010, "Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry."

The number of children in this age group diagnosed with bipolar disorder also doubled over the last decade, Reuters reported.

Of antipsychotic-treated children in the 2007 study sample, the most common diagnoses were pervasive developmental disorder or mental retardation (28.2% ), ADHD (23.7% ), and disruptive behavior disorder (12.9% ).

The study reported that fewer than half of drug treated children received a mental health assessment (40.8% ), a psychotherapy visit (41.4% ), or a visit with a psychiatrist (42.6% ) during the year of antipsychotic use.

"Antipsychotics, which are being widely and irresponsibly prescribed for American children--mostly as chemical restraints--are shown to be causing irreparable harm," warned Vera Hassner Sharav, president of the Alliance for Human Research Protection, in a February 26, 2010 InfoMail.

"These drugs have measurable severe hazardous effects on vital biological systems, including: cardiovascular adverse effects that result in shortening lives; metabolic adverse effects that induce diabetes and the metabolic syndrome," she wrote. "Long-term use of antipsychotics has been shown to result in metabolic syndrome in 40% to 50% of patients."

The lead researcher on the study above, Columbia University psychiatry professor Mark Olfson, told Reuters that about 1.5% of all privately insured children between the ages of 2 and 5, or one in 70, received some type of psychiatric drug in 2007, be it an antipsychotic, a mood stabilizer, a stimulant or an antidepressant.

Psychiatric drugs bathe the brains of growing children with agents that threaten the normal development of the brain, according to Dr Peter Breggin, founder of the International Center for the Study of Psychiatry and Psychology (ICSPP), and author of about 20 books, including "Medication Madness."

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The drugs themselves are causing severe disorders in millions of children in the US, he warns. "Substances like antidepressants, stimulants, mood stabilizers, and antipsychotic drugs cause severe, and potentially permanent, biochemical imbalances."

American Phenomenon

A number of presentations at the annual meeting of the American Psychiatric Association in May 2009, addressed the diagnosis of bipolar disorder, including one titled, "Pediatric Bipolar Disorder: A Critical Look at an American Phenomenon," at which Dr Peter Parry, a consultant child & adolescent psychiatrist, and senior lecturer at Flinders University in Australia, presented a survey on, "Australian and New Zealand's Child and Adolescent Psychiatrists' Views on Bipolar Disorder Prevalence and on Rates of Pediatric Bipolar Disorder in the USA."

Dr Parry and his colleagues conducted a survey of child and adolescent psychiatrists in Australia and New Zealand. Of the 199 psychiatrists who responded to the survey, 90.5% thought pediatric bipolar disorder was overdiagnosed in the US.

In an October 1, 2009 article titled, "Medicating Our Children," Dr Parry reports that since "the mid-1990s in the USA, some researchers have claimed that Paediatric Bipolar Disorder (PBD) frequently starts prior to puberty."

One of PBD's main proponents, Harvard University's Professor Joseph Biederman, stating onset "is squarely in the preschooler age group," he notes.

Parry explains that "PBD has been created by moving the diagnostic goalposts away from traditional concepts of bipolar disorder."

"In children," he says, "episodes were redefined to last hours instead of days or weeks and, instead of manic elation, severe anger in children sufficed as mania."

"Unlike diagnoses like ADHD or depression, or simply accepting a child has serious emotional and behavioural problems in reaction to various stressors, PBD implies a lifelong severe mental illness requiring of strong psychiatric medication," Parry warns.

"In the USA," he says, "the public is furthermore exposed to direct pharmaceutical advertising that can feed the natural desire parents of distressed and aggressive children have for a quick solution by suggesting a simple medication fix."

"The medicating of America's children has become intensely controversial, highlighted by the tragic case of Rebecca Riley, a four-year-old Boston girl diagnosed at 28 months old with ADHD and PBD," he points out.

Evelyn Pringle is a columnist for Independent Media TV and an investigative journalist focused on exposing corruption in government.


Source:
http://www.alternet.org/drugs/146551<BR>


And these are supposed to be the future of the America...!

now this is more like it. anti-american rhetoric wooo-hooo!

unfortunately, i don't really have strong opinions on doping. i think some of these parents end up taking the drugs themselves. they use their kids as proxies.

interesting thread though.

And on a further note. It seems the public school system does not want any child with a personality in their class room. Nor a soul. They want well mannered robots. If they are not as such, you will get called into the school to have 'the talk' about ADD/ADHD. And yes, I am speaking from experience. Highly intelligent children who are bored seem to be a behavioral problem.

While I appreciate the many advances in modern psychology, I have a feeling we're going to look back at a lot of this stuff like we do electro shock treatment...

Posted by venusianbull
And on a further note. It seems the public school system does not want any child with a personality in their class room. Nor a soul. They want well mannered robots. If they are not as such, you will get called into the school to have 'the talk' about ADD/ADHD. And yes, I am speaking from experience. Highly intelligent children who are bored seem to be a behavioral problem.

i agree! the public schools give the "easy way out". this happened with every one of my children. i was asked by several school officials if i had ever thought about putting my children on medication for ADD/ADHD. one teacher went as far to say that my child didn't have the right to make a choice for her future and that i should put her on drugs immediately! i did start her on the drugs, but, i didn't like what they were doing to her. so, i took her off of them! with my other children, i was asked but, i refused.

2 of my sis's kids are on meds for various reasons. one takes a mood stabilizer and antidepressant, the other takes meds for ADHD/bipolar. all cuz she couldn't handle out-spoken/hyper kids. i hate seeing what the meds do to them! she now has zombie kids!

now, it's really sad to see ppl wanting to take the easy(lazy) way out of things.... there's no benefit, only long term harm.

Same with my sister. She was highly intelligent, but extremely hyper and not being stimulated enough. She was diagnosed with ADHD, and while I do believe she has it (still does), the meds were horrible. She turned into a zombie and wouldn't eat. Luckily we both got accepted into really good junior highs in the 4th grade, so because she was being challenged, her behavior improved.

I see why Tubb ass and a lot of people on here are the way they are . I think the americans got the idea of druging childern from norways school systems. very interesting or as monty would say ITS

There was a young man a year or two ago that passed away from massive coronary. He was 17 years of age and on the ADD/ADHD medication and it was a factor. So heart breaking.
And hmmm, gee, has anyone stopped and considered that all these behavioral issues did not exist 20-30 years ago and longer? You screwed up in school you got a lick in the principals office and another for good measure when you got home for being a horses rear end at school. "No child left behind"? It used to be if a child simply could not keep up they were moved to a class room where they could. It was much more realistic and better geared. And children used to respect teacher. Not so any more.

I don't fault the teachers per se, they are really taking on a lot. The class loads are too high for one adult, and they're helpless to reprimand anyone for fear of a law suit. Their hands are tied in a lot of ways. And round and round it goes.
The college should be training for what you love. A doctor should go into it because they want to be a healer, a teacher should because she really enjoys children and is excited about molding young minds and cramming them full of information.
And in effect I do blame parents as well. The family dynamic has gone downhill. With junior on his Wii, parents at job or on separate comps. No one is communicating like they used too, going out and enjoying each other like they used too. That coupled with how busy and stressed out, and heaping more of the same on themselves with endless activities, taking them hither and yon. It's a family of strangers basically. Isolated, when they should be united.

What is the deep south?

Southeastern region of the U.S. Primarily South Carolina, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. 🙂

so the southern U.S.A.

Aka part of the "bible belt", true ??axis of evil??...

that being one of the two american belts I have heard of the bible belt and the rust belt. Billy Joel (Allen Town).