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Kids on ADHD drugs – dangerous path to addiction
Experts say the stimulant drugs prescribed for the
treatment of ADHD are not only dangerous, they are highly addictive. And
although no drug has been approved for the treatment of autism, drugs
are routinely prescribed off-label to treat autistic children. According
to the National Center for Health Statistics, over the period of 5 years
between 1997 and 2002, the number of children between the age of 3 to
17, diagnosed with ADHD went from 3.3 million to 4.4 million.
In direct correlation, the number of children
prescribed ADHD drugs also rose steadily. In fact, spending on these
types of medications for children is now higher than spending on
antibiotics and asthma drugs. In February 2006, the FDA revealed that
between 1999 and 2003, seventy-eight million prescriptions for ADHD
drugs were written for children between the ages of 1 to 18. Terry
Davis, a member of an FDA advisory committee, has said prescriptions for
ADHD drugs filled annually have a value of $3.1 billion. According to Dr
Peter Breggin, author of "Talking Back To Ritalin, “parents and teachers
and even doctors have been badly misled by drug company marketing
practices,” he warns. “Drug companies have targeted children as a big
market likely to boost profits and children are suffering as a result."
What critics say is most alarming, is the fact that
very young children are being placed on drugs. A study published in the
Journal of the American Medical Association in 2000 provides some
insight into this trend. The study found that fifty-seven percent of 223
Michigan Medicaid patients younger than 4, diagnosed with ADHD, received
at least one psychotropic drug during a 15-month period in 1995 to 1996.
Additionally, the study found that in the Medicaid population in
Midwestern states, there was a 3-fold increase in the prescribing of
stimulant drugs between 1991 and 1995 for children between the age of 2
and four.
More recent statistics show a 369% increase in
spending on ADHD drugs for children under five. From 2000 to 2003, the
rise in the use of attention deficit drugs by children under 5
contributed to an overall 23% increase for all children, according to an
analysis by the nation's largest prescription benefit manager, Medco
Health Solutions. The debate over the drugging of children in this
country has been raging on for years. Schools have been accused of
promoting the use of drugs to control normal but active children. At a
September 26, 2002, Reform Committee hearing on the “Overmedication of
Hyperactive Children,” Chairman, Rep Dan Burton (R-IN), asked
pediatrician, Dr Mary Ann Block, "what have you found that the schools
do specifically to encourage the use of medications for attention and
behavior?"
Dr Block said, "parents that come to me report
consistently that the teachers and the principals and even the school
nurses pressure them to go to a physician and get their child labeled
and drugged." "Some schools," she said, "are giving lectures to parents,
inviting parents to come hear talks about diagnosing and drugging their
children for ADHD." Congressman Burton pointed out what he considered to
be inadequate and unscientific methods of diagnosing ADHD: "When you
take your child to a doctor, instead of blood tests and a thorough
medical evaluation, you have a conversation with a doctor about the
school's checklist. And you leave a few minutes later with a
prescription for your young child for a psychotropic drug." "Did the
doctor test your child for a thyroid disorder? Did your doctor test your
child for a heavy metal toxicity? Did you doctor talk to you about your
child's allergies? "Did your doctor even mention nutrition or possible
food sensitivity? Did your doctor ask if your child's IQ had been tested
and if he was gifted? Probably not," he said.
Sandra Lucas testifies at FDA advisory committee
hearings on behalf of the Citizens Commission on Human Rights, a
psychiatric watchdog group. She produced a copy of a January 20, 2005,
pamphlet used at a training seminar for teachers composed by Susan
Barton, who billed herself as the "Founder of Bright Solutions for
Dyslexia," located in San Jose California. Under Medication for ADD, Ms
Barton states: "Medication is the most often an essential component to
effective treatment for the ADD child." "As I've said many times now,"
she told the teaches, "ADD is a neurobiological disorder and needs to be
treated as such." Ms Barton also says that without medication, other
interventions are ineffective, and claims: "This medication does not
cause illegal drug use or addiction." Dr Fred Baughman, author of "The
ADHD Fraud - How Psychiatry Makes Patients of Normal Children," and one
of the nation's leading experts on the issue, vehemently disagrees. He
calls the medical practice of ADHD a fraud - "one in which the FDA was
fully complicit," he says. "ADHD doesn't exist--it is not a physical
abnormality," he explains, "and as such bears no risk of causing
physical injury or death as does every drug used in its treatment," he
says.
In testimony on behalf of the International Center for
the Study of Psychiatry and Psychology, at the March 22 and 23, 2006,
FDA advisory committee hearings on the dangers of ADHD drugs, Dr
Baughman asked the panel of experts to "give us the reference, cite to
the article, giving proof that ADHD is a disease." He also asked the
committee to give the reference, or cite the literature, that describes
the test that provides objective evidence that children diagnosed with
ADHD have a disease. The silence in the hearing room was deafening.
According to Dr Baughman, no one answered the questions because there is
no study, test, or scientific literature to back up the assertion that
ADHD is a disease. "ADHD is not a disease," Dr Baughman says. "This
being the case," he maintains, "giving such drugs for ADHD is not "help"
or "treatment"." He makes the point "that all practice of medicine
begins with diagnosis." "Informed consent," Dr Baughman explained,
"demands not just a description of the drugs or surgery to be used but
of the condition they are to be used on--its prognosis and how that
natural course/prognosis is likely to be altered by the treatments to be
applied."
At the March 2006, FDA advisory committee hearings, it
was noted that no other countries are drugging children with stimulants.
In fact, psychiatrist, Dr Grace Jackson, who also testified at the
hearing, explains in her book, "Rethinking Psychiatric Drugs," how in
1996 and 1997, the World Health Organization issued press releases about
the rise in the use of the stimulant, Ritalin, in this country, "noting
that the United States was responsible for 90% of the drug's production
and consumption." At the time, the International Narcotics Control Board
identified a number of concerns about America's use of the drug,
including the dangers of: "inappropriate diagnosis of ADHD; widely
divergent prescribing patterns; off-label prescribing to children under
six; and excessive duration of treatment," Dr Jackson reports.
A report by the FDA released in February 2006, said
that between 1999 and 2003, there were 25 deaths in persons using ADHD
drugs, including the deaths of 19 children. The FDA also reported
receiving more than 50 cases of cardiovascular problems, including
stoke, heart attack, hypertension, palpitations and arrhythmia. Because
only between 1 and 10% of adverse events are ever reported to the FDA,
the numbers above represent an extreme understatement of actual cases of
harm, critics point out. According to the Drug Abuse Warning Network,
there were only 271 Ritalin-related emergency room visits in 1990, but
there were 1,478 Ritalin-related emergency visits recorded in 2001. In
1999, the National Institute of Drug Abuse, found some 165
Ritalin-related poison calls in Detroit and 419 cases in Texas. Of the
nearly 600 calls, only 114 cases involved intentional misuse or abuse.
Dr Breggin maintains that ADHD drugs actually bring on the symptoms they
are supposed to treat such as hyperactivity, impulsivity and
inattention, which can lead to a vicious cycle of incorrect and
dangerous dosage increases, he warns. In addition, Dr Breggin says,
stimulants can cause “agitation and irritability, anger, hostility,
disinhibition, hypomania and mania.”
A recent review of data by the FDA seems to verify Dr
Breggins assertions. The FDA found that children on ADHD drugs had an
increased the risk of psychosis, a mental disorder characterized by the
inability to distinguish between real and imaginary events. The most
important finding, the FDA said, was that signs of psychosis or mania,
particularly hallucinations, occurred in patients with no risk factors,
at the usual doses of any of the drugs used to treat ADHD. The FDA found
a "substantial portion of the psychosis-related cases were reported to
occur in children 10 years or less," an age group which does not
typically suffer from psychosis, the FDA said.
From January 2000, through June 30, 2005, FDA
identified nearly 1,000 reports of psychosis or mania possibly linked to
the drugs, including Ritalin, Adderall, Concerta, and Strattera. Most of
people who have investigated the matter seem to agree that heavy metal
poisoning is by far the most likely cause of the epidemic in autism
spectrum disorders that erupted in the 1990s. Studies show that the
mercury-based preservative, thimerosal, that was used in all childhood
vaccines until recently, is the likely culprit.
Beginning in the late 1980s, the CDC began adding more
and more vaccines to the immunization schedule but failed to keep track
of the toxic levels of mercury that children would receive as each new
shot was added to the list or the amount of mercury that infants would
receive when 3-in-one shots were injected. Nancy and Tim Hokkanen are
the parents of Andy, a 6 year-old boy who was diagnosed with autism but
who is now recovering from mercury poisoning. In June 2002 a neurologist
prescribed Adderal for Andy. "My son became psychotic," Nancy said, "for
four days by mid-afternoon he had to be held down in a dark quiet room
while he screamed himself limp." Next the neurologist prescribed
Ritalin, saying, "Usually if one drug doesn't work, the other one does,"
Nancy continued. "My instincts told me that this was another disaster in
the making," she said, "so I quit seeing that neurologist and began
reading studies."
Nancy discovered the theory of mercury poisoning
published by chemistry experts, Boyd Haley, PhD and Andrew Hall Cutler,
PhD, in the study, "Autism: a novel form of mercury poisoning," which
documents about 100 matching symptoms. In November 2002, when Andy was 4
and-a-half, tests were done on Andy's hair, blood, urine and stool
samples, and the test results showed mercury toxicity as well as high
levels of copper and other metals, and various nutritional
insufficiencies. Within 2 weeks of giving Andy supplement including
Vitamin B-6, zinc, manganese and magnesium, he showed drastic
improvements in mood, behavior and abilities, Nancy says. "We had an
almost-normal Christmas," she reported, "without tantrums and bizarre
behavior."
The Hokkenans estimate that their insurance company
was billed about $100,000 for therapy to treat autism. "However, we
never noticed any drastic improvement until we began biomedical
treatment, which has cost about $2,000," Nancy says. "Strangely," she
notes, "our insurance company wouldn't cover the costs of those medical
tests." Nancy says that since public health officials realized their
error of failing to keep track of the toxic mercury levels in vaccines
in 1999, she views the failure to restrict the use of mercury in
vaccines as a form of fatal entrenchment -- "when an unhealthy practice
or norm is allowed to continue, she explained, "simply because it has
been done that way for so long." In addition to all the other side
effects associated with ADHD drugs, Dr David Stein, author of "Unraveling
the ADD/ADHD Fiasco," says stimulant drugs are "near the top of the heap
of potentially addictive drugs." He says, "we have no way of knowing
which child has a potential risk for becoming addicted to drugs."
Recent studies have shown that more and more students
are using the drugs illegally. In 2004, a nationwide University of
Michigan study on non-medical use of amphetamines, found 4.9% of 8th
graders had used stimulants in the previous year, 8.5% of 10th graders
had used the drugs, and one in 10 seniors admitted to non-medical use of
amphetamines. The Partnership for a Drug Free America, released the
results of a survey in 2005, that polled more than 7,300 teenagers, and
found one in 10 teenagers, or 2.3 million young people, had tried ADHD
drugs without a doctor’s prescription, and that 29% of those surveyed
said they had close friends who had abused the drugs. Experts agree that
the wide-spread prescribing of stimulants will lead many children down
the path to addiction and they warn of the perils that will follow.
"Psychology and psychiatry have extremely poor track records for
treating abuse and addiction problems," Dr Stein notes, "and therefore
the very drugs they are recommending can trigger a problem from which
there may be no return." If medical professionals begin telling children
at a very young age that they can change the way they think, feel, and
behave by simply taking a pill, they will logically continue to take
drugs in attempt to mood-alter whenever they have problems in life.
Evelyn Pringle
10 April 2006
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0604/S00099.htm
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