Health101.org
presents
Drugging
Our Children to Death
by Tom DeWeese
The
new year calls to us to save the many children in our nation's schools
who will be diagnosed with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder
(ADHD) and prescribed mind-altering drugs. This evil grows exponentially
and, with it, the tragedies whose stories are rising to the surface
of public notice.
This
pseudo-psychological racket is big business. Sales of pharmaceuticals
to treat ADHD snowballed to $758 million in the year 2000, and show
no signs of slowing down. However, more and more parents are growing
skeptical of the diagnoses and subsequent coercive drugging of their
children. Spurred by tragedy, some are fighting back.
Lawrence
Smith of Michigan and Vicky Dunkle of Pennsylvania both tragically
lost their children to psychiatric drugs prescribed to treat their
ADHD. Mr. Smith's 14-year-old son, Matthew died of a heart attack
he had while skateboarding. The coroner determined his death was
caused by the long-term use of a stimulant that had been forcibly
prescribed to him through his school. Early last year, Mrs. Dunkle's
daughter, Shaina, died in her mother's arms after convulsing in
her doctor's office. She was just 10 years old.
Lawrence
and Vicky, bonded by common tragedy, are fighting back. They are
determined to expose the fraud surrounding ADHD and the forced drugging
of normal children. The problems started for both parents when they
were approached by school social workers and psychologists. They
were told that their children were "too active," "easily distracted,"
and that they "talked out of turn." Lawrence and Vicky shrugged
off these diagnoses as simply normal traits of energetic youngsters.
Then
came the iron fist of government.
Smith
was told: "if we didn't consider drugging our son after the school
had diagnosed him with ADHD that we could be charged for neglecting
his educational and emotional needs. If we hadn't been pressured
by the school system, Matthew would still be alive today." Mrs.
Dunkle agrees. "If I had followed my heart instead of the advice
of 'professionals' that thought they knew my daughter better than
I did, my precious Shaina would be alive now."
What
is going on here? Since when did government schools get in the business
of forcing mind-altering drugs on children against their parent's
will?
In
1965, the passage of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act
(ESEA), changed education forever as the seeds for today's massive
restructuring-away from academics and toward behavior modification-began.
It was psychology's crowning moment. The ESEA allocated massive
federal funds and opened school doors to a flood of psychiatrists,
psychologists, social workers and the psychiatric programs and testing
needed to validate them. The number of educational psychologists
in the U.S. increased from 455 in 1969 to 16,146 by 1992. As of
1994, child psychologists, psychiatrists, counselors and special
educators in and around U.S. public schools nearly outnumber teachers.
In
1991, eligibility rules for federal education grants were changed
to provide schools with $400 in annual grant money for each child
diagnosed with ADHD! That same year the Department of Education
formally recognized ADHD as a handicap and directed all state education
officers to establish procedures to screen and identify ADHD children
and provide them with special education and psychological services.
As a result, the number of ADHD cases soared again. [So there
is little incentive to improve school menus when doing so may reduce
the school's grant money because improved diet has been shown to
reduce "behavioral conditions". - Don]
Today
more than 7,000,000 children have been labeled and registered as
permanent patients of the school system. Ten to twelve percent of
all boys between the ages of 6 and 14 in the United States have
been diagnosed as having ADHD. One in every 30 Americans between
the ages of 5 and 19 years old has a prescription to Ritalin. Psychologists
have never had it so good. The federal trough has been very good
for their industry.
With
more than half of those 7,000,000 children also prescribed Ritalin,
the stock-market value of its manufacturer, the Swiss pharmaceutical
company Novartis, has also soared. Now that company and others are
working to introduce a host of new drugs into the classroom, including
Prozac and Luvox, which has just been approved by the Food and Drug
Administration for pediatric use.
The
industry is looking to even greater growth as the pill brigade is
targeting pre-school toddlers. The use of psychotropic drugs, like
anti-depressants and stimulants, in two to four year olds more than
doubled between 1991 and 1995. The federal trough has been very
good to the pharmaceutical industry as well.
As
this sickening practice goes unchecked and unquestioned more children
are being drugged into a mind-numbing stupor, deteriorating under
the long-term effects of their prescriptions. In the worst cases,
children are dying.
Tom
DeWeese is publisher/editor of The DeWeese Report and president
of the American Policy Center, a grassroots, activist think tank
headquartered in Warrenton, VA. The Center maintains an Internet
site at www.americanpolicy.org
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