The number of children on Medicaid taking antipsychotic drugs has tripled in just ten years—and shockingly, many of them are under the age of three.
Note that these are not just antidepressants, which are bad enough. We are talking about strong antipsychotic drugs. These are so strong that many adults stop taking them because of severe side effects. How can a three-year-old protect himself or herself from the toxic effects of these drugs on their undeveloped brains and bodies?
The US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is launching an investigation into the over-prescription of antipsychotics to children on Medicaid, and has already asked all fifty states to provide more oversight of these prescriptions. Medicaid more than doubled the amount it spent on antipsychotic drugs between 1999 and 2008 (the last year for which data is available), and now spends $3.8 billion on antipsychotics, more than any other class of drugs.
In 2004, a child on Medicaid was four times more likely to be on antipsychotics than a child with private insurance. And it’s not just the older kids: of the 600,000 minors in the Medicaid program who were on antipsychotics in 2008, more than half were under the age of 14.
So far, the HHS probe has found that 482 children under the age of three were prescribed antipsychotics, and 107 children under the age of two. Six were under a year old, and one was an infant just one month old. This is almost unbelievable. Are we still living in the dark ages that we would do this to a newborn?
Disturbing as this is, a spokeswoman for the Texas Health and Human Services Commission defended the prescriptions, saying, “For infants, the drugs aren’t being used for behavior. The infants most often have seizures or complex health issues like heart and respiratory problems, and these drugs can be prescribed to help with discomfort.”
Did she say “discomfort?” Keep in mind that common side effects for one common psychiatric medication include a shuffling walk, drooling, rapid weight gain, and the inability to speak. Stopping the antipsychotics often involves a wrenching withdrawal period of nausea, vomiting, insomnia, tremors, dizziness, and even hallucinations. It’s a terrifying list even for an adult, and even more so for the very young children being given these drugs. Over-prescription of these powerful drugs is a lose-lose situation for both taxpayers and the children who take them.
The antipsychotics used today are known as second and third generation antipsychotics, and have names such as Abilify (which is the nation’s top-selling prescription drug), Risperdal, Seroquel, and Zyprexa. They replaced drugs such as Haldol and Thorazine, the first generation antipsychotics. Antipsychotics were originally developed to treat psychoses such as schizophrenia, but some now have FDA approval for the treatment of children with bipolar disorder, as well as irritability associated with autism. However, antipsychotics were never actually tested on children, and were never intended for long-term use, even in adults.
We reported two years ago about the excessive number of kids in foster homes taking antipsychotics. Because of the huge number of people on government assistance who are on these drugs, 70% of the total spent for antipsychotics in the US is paid by the US government—that is, taxpayers. This is nothing less than crony capitalism in action: pharmaceutical companies donate heavily to political campaigns, and legislators pass laws that compensate them in spades for the amount donated. Those who pay the real price are the poor and powerless.
Assessing any drug is difficult, since trials with negative results are often buried and the trial simply repeated. One study showed that roughly half of all drug trials for antidepressants had positive results, and half did not. However, 97% of the positive results were published in peer-reviewed journals, while only 8% of the negative studies were! A doctor reviewing clinical journals could easily come to the conclusion that antidepressants are much more effective than they are.
In 2012, a judge in Arkansas ordered Johnson & Johnson and a subsidiary, Janssen Pharmaceuticals, to pay more than $1.2 billion in fines for minimizing the dangers associated with the antipsychotic Risperdal. Texas settled a case with Janssen for $158 million and a South Carolina judge fined them $327 million. A Louisiana jury awarded $258 million in damages. And they are now being sued by Kentucky for concealing the harmful side effects of Risperdal, which include stroke, diabetes, and weight gain.
If not antipsychotics, what do these kids need? An integrative physician who deals with either physical or psychiatric disorders should, of course, be your first and best resource. And it should go without saying that all children need a secure, loving home, nutritious meals, regular exercise, and protection from abuse and other dangers. Importantly, that also means protection from abuse by the medical system.
In addition, children at risk for psychiatric problems are good candidates for a program of omega-3 fatty acids: a study in the Archives of General Psychiatry found that fish oil supplements beat mental illness. The study involved eighty-one people deemed to be at high risk for psychosis. The randomized, placebo-controlled study provided fish oil supplements to half the study subjects for twelve weeks; the other half received placebos. Eleven people in the placebo group developed a psychotic disorder, but only two in the fish oil group did.
But love, nutrition, exercise, security, and fish oil cannot be patented, eliminating the profit incentive to supply them. By contrast, with Medicaid laying out $3.8 billion per year on antipsychotics for children, the motivation to try to control a troubled child with a pill is evidently quite strong.
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the pharma industry will not be sated until everyone of us is trapped in their pill popping net
If parents were allowed to discipline their children,,, there would be no need for drugs.
I blame all of this on Childrens Services.
I agree that children should not be put on these dangerous drugs. In fact, I don’t think there is a place for them at all and they should be outlawed all together, since from the research I have seen, there is no scientific basis for prescribing them whatsoever. And they have horrible side effects like violent aggressive behavior or suicidal tendencies.I wouldn’t want that for anyone, especially not children. What do you want to bet these school shootings are committed by people that are taking these drugs? This is not medicine it is a horrible experiment gone wrong. I agree that nutrition, exercise, exercise,etc should be used instead. Maybe a dose of common sense would be another good idea.
ANY parent that does NOT do their due diligence to get at least 3 recommendations for drugs for their child.. from different Doctors NOT in the Same clinic .. is not looking out for the welfare of their child. EXTREMELY FEW children .. really need any kind of drug.. they just need more one on one time with parents regarding their behavior!!
I believe no child at any age should be put on these drugs they do nothing to alter behavior.
I believe these drugs will make problems worse. This is a pill popping society and all drugs no matter what they are should be looked into. Adults are having trouble with prescription drugs. we need to say NO NO NO!!!!. I have had some drugs for gout that just about killed me I can’t take them.
But with Obama Care we are going to be made to take drugs regardless if it hurts us or not.
Big brother is now going to tell you what to take what to eat what kind of job to have.
Don’t we as human beings have a right to say how these things affect us. Time we stand up for our children and us big Bully Government needs to take the back seat.
My sister was hospitalized for anxiety and diagnosed with schizophrenia in 1960 and spent the rest of her life in psychiatric institutions. She stopped talking except in strange “riddles” until the 1990’s when I complained and she was moved to a new institution where she was evaluated and her medications were changed. Very quickly she started talking. I feel most of her life was lost from the medications. She now has other disabilities and is at home where she is at. We visit about once a month.
Great read!
I do not disagree that gov’t and pharmaceuticals are holding each others hand, BUT the parents are the ones that need to be educated. My kids are on Medicaid, and not one of them is on any sort of drug!
There are natural ways to heal if the drug companies could be integrated into our health system I think everyone whougl better.
Perhaps all these children are suffering from ‘ Temper-tantrum disorder’…it’s a disease you know? It’s disturbing that children are being targeted but it’s even more disturbing that any adult ( parent, teacher or physician) would approve of such treatments.
Children represent the largest US population of involuntary mentally ill patients. Does anyone ask why that is? I mean , even IF the children were actually mentally ill, doesn’t anyone care enough to wonder why that is? We all know that it’s highly unlikely the majority, if any at all, are mentally ill. (Then again, having to learn in a very uninspiring environment limited to SOL requirements would drive anyone with half a brain mad).
Schools receive a lot of money for ADHD diagnoses ( thanks to the ‘ no child left behind’) and so, is it realistic to expect the schools that are already underfunded to uphold ethics and morals when they have the opportunity to capitalize on their students? Not anymore, if ever we could. It’s certainly easier to medicate a child into compliance with conventional standards rather than taking time to teach, inspire and respectfully correct.
Sadly much of this is due to overprescription of these drugs by practioners. ADHD stimulants were some of the first. 5% of Population (mostly boys) truly has ADHD, but something like 18% of kids are prescribed them.
Why is 2008 the last year from which figures are available?
Can’t someone get more recent, more relevant data from the NSA?
Or are the data collectors and colaters and button pushers all on ind numbing psychoactive meds?
This is a very interesting article. As an educator I see this happening more and more to children on Medicaid. Lately,a lot of children are supposedly diagnosed with ADHD. They are given medication for something that has no test to determine if you have that condition. Parents need to wake up and stop giving their children all that stuff with tons of side effects. Instead, do the research and try some simple yet natural alternative like changing your food, lifestyle, exercise, and supplements.
This is an excellent article and should be published in a more open media forum. Is there a vote pending on the budgeting of the Medicaid healthcare, and who is charge of this committee? This would be good to submit, and many would agree that this is a reasonable request to focus on. For example, protect the children by channeling this money to resources that provide free fish oil supplements, and gardening and nutrition classes. Children in schools can be directly affected through a program there.
This is unconscionable! Seems it’s all about money…..our children should NOT be taking these toxic drugs at this young age…There are other ways to help….please do the right thing….thank you.
While school testing for academic reasons continues to be pushed on younger children all of the time, the so-called science behind the testing shows that any testing below third grade is essentially pointless. But it will rip money out of a school system which is forced to administer those tests.
If the academic testing is essentially inconclusive in a basically un-formed little person, how can any psychiatric assertions be pounded into such malleable young ones!!!!!
There is NO way to measure the damages to esteem and other levels of being in forcing these innocents to be put on these toxins. So few people even realize that Ritalin is used in cocaine studies because it has the exact same biochemical actions as cocaine. In this instance, we force our babies to essentially become coke addicts – and SIXTY PERCENT of the children on Ritalin eventually spend some time addicted to cocaine AFTER school, when they are forced to withdraw..
Insanity, but then we have so little wisdom in our alleged civilization today.
Does Medicaid prescribe drugs? I didn’t know Medicaid or any other health care provider actually wrote drug scripts. Perhaps the argument is with the physicians prescribing.
I work in the disability area and regularly see medical records of children. What I have noticed is that this type of medication is often prescribed by physicians for young children who are considered behavior problems, i.e. what used to be called acting up. They may be assigned a diagnosis like oppositional defiant disorder and put on these medications, because parents don’t know how to deal with them. I am seeing this much more frequently than I was, say, five years ago.
The recent tragedy in Colorado is not the first. Robert A. Hawkins, 19, opened fire with a rife at a busy shopping mall killing eight people before taking his own life in Omaha. Looking back, we had the tragedy at Virginia Tech caused by Cho Seung-Hui. Moreover, the first of this series of heartbreaking disasters was Columbine. What groups these events together is not addressed widely. Sadly, these results of drugged youth are a deadly price to others.
In the Columbine incident, great attention was in the media, without the real cause. That the students were on drugs was not widely shared. One survivor of Columbine, Mark Taylor, in his testimony before the FDA 9/13/2004 stated, “As Americans we should have the right to feel safe and if you were doing your job we would be safe. Why are we worrying about terrorists in other countries when the pharmaceutical companies have proven to be our biggest terrorists by releasing these drugs on an unsuspecting public?
A publication of the New York Times called Insight on the News on June 28, 1999 had the lead story on its cover-” Guns and Doses: The Common Link on the High School Shootings May Be Psychotropic Drugs Like Ritalin” One story is about David who was compelled by school officials to receive the drug to handle his ‘hyperactivity’. “David would complain. He didn’t like the feel of his body when he took the pills,” Mrs. Verne Watson said. Finally, one day, her son collapsed before school and told her, “I just can’t take them anymore, they’re torturing me.”
Another often-used drug is Prozac, the company was charged with among other things, failing to disclose the dangers of Prozac in causing violence and suicide. Last year, Prozac earned $2 billion for Eli Lilly.
In Omaha, this shooting reached beyond the schools and the nine victims of a mall shooting range in age from 24 to 66. Robert A. Hawkins, 19, had been a ward of the state. These children become prey for drugging according to many administrators and spokespersons. Over-drugging of youth, including those in the foster care system, has grown into a huge national problem with no signs of slowing down. Some of the drugs prescribed to children and teens are known to cause suicidal tendencies, yet they continue to be prescribed. Some children have reported they were given up to 18 different drugs at one time.
It is time to be more open to alternatives. Antidepressant-induced manic behaviors like fire…
Many health maladies are caused by dietary deficiencies. Certainly those should be explored before using more risky & costly drugs that have dangerous side effects. Terrible crimes have been committed while a person was on antipsychotics. Psychological counseling might be called for as well. One size does not fit all.
Hello, I’m on two antipsychotic drugs, Resperidol and Seroquel.I have asked to be taken off both os them, thus far, the doctorreduced the Seroquel to 50 mg per day and refused to reduce or remove the Resperidol. I have gained almost 100 lbs and can barely walk. I’m in a wheelchair.
Do I have any recourse in this matter? Thanks for your interest. Ann Moore
I am sadended at this information. These drugs will change the brain structure of these little children forever. I oppose the use of these medications in anyone, much less children.
Pleas send this to all Of Congress and the White House.
this has to be one of the saddest realities in corporate ruled USA most of these children will not have chance at a decent life should they survive, they will inevitably wind up in some foreign land witnessing the slaughter until they too, are put to rest.
America’s mega businesses have no moral compasses. They are after more & more money, because that allows them to buy off the Legal & Political systems. Our banks, our courts, our congress, our lawyers are owned by the the likes of the drug industry & investment bankers that support them. We are a totally sick nation with no moral leaders coming forth any time soon.
Thank you for bringing this to the public’s attention. The article pointed out the strong $$$ financial incentive to drug our kids to death. Profits over people – sad ! It will take a massive public outcry to change a dysfunctional, $ self $ serving $ system, but this is a start. Thank you and keep up the work. Continued Blessings.
Antipsychotics were never tested on children and were not intended for long use, even for adults.
This is horrendous and demeaning to human beings and their children. We ( or maybe the drug companies) no longer want children to be children and if they are sometimes disruptive we medicate them. This is totally unacceptable in a sane society but maybe we are brainwashed and drugged ourselves. We must stop following the herd and be individuals and think for ourselves. I would say about half of all people taking drugs do not need them and could find other natural ways of dealing with their illness or problem.
Get up a petition on moveon.org. on this issue!
This article was heartbreaking. It is a crime to be giving these toddlers these kinds of drugs. The unintended consequences of these meds on these developing minds has to be horrific. Of course, when one of these poisoned children “goes postal” it will the drug-car-gun-or whatever’s fault. A very sad article, these poor children will never have a decent chance at liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
To quote Henry Kissinger of the new world order 1981: “We will have our new kind of human being either by consent or conquest, and we will start with the children.”
big pharma fda, its all politics! big $$ ! they don’t care abt u or ur kids n johnson n johnson , the worst! they wld kill u soon as look at you! i hv knwn for sometime they drug the foster kids soon as they come into the system, i knw this 1st hand! n for seizures ,hw abt chiropractic care as a choice also!
The answer to children that can not sit still or pay attention seems to be to drug them. The real problem is did the child get enough sleep?, get enough to eat or the right kind of food? Did the child get some exercise walking to school or is the neighborhood too dangerous? Is the school day mixed with classes, playground time and some activities just for fun or do they have to study for the meap all day.
There was an experiment done in a school in the midwest some years ago by a teacher ( its been a while and I do not remember all the details). She toke over the feeding of all the children in a grade school with all natural food, no additives, dyes, sucrose etc and she eliminated almost all the cases of attention deficit. The old saying you are what you eat is true!
Google “Abilify kills” – it’s from Andy Behrman, a former spokesman for Abilify and Bristol Myers Squibb, discusses his side effects from Abilify, the “wonder drug” of Bristol Myers Squibb.
This is just another sad story of what’s happening with our health system. I don’t knw what the answer is, but something has to be done to protect these defenseless children.
After getting natural health care to get rid of my son’s autism, tourettes, anxiety, and my own anxiety and ADD, I learned a few things. But, none of them are money-makers, so INSURANCE (which is mandatory) isn’t going to do them because they can’t afford to give up their refill money.
VOUCHER is the solution (not integrative where you can’t go further than pharmaceutical doctor without permission), but I think we have to follow the constitution and implement the republican GOP health care plan before we can progress to voucher. You can’t pass law that would bankrupt an industry unless you are following the constitution (I’m not sure how that works, but I’ve read it). Voucher would create a supply and demand market where consumers are in control.
1. ALL SYMPTOMS AND DISEASES start in the digestive tract and are caused by protein deficiency and/or inflammation. Number one problem is yeast overgrowth and leaky gut syndrome. We have no live beneficial bacteria or enzymes in our foods, mainly because we don’t ferment foods since refrigeration, also because of pasteurization and irradiation. See GAPS youtube videos. They apply to all illnesses.
2. ALL SYMPTOMS AND DISEASES can be traced to a mineral deficiency. This is secondary to intestinal problems. Trace minerals detox heavy metals, most serious illnesses are associated with heavy metal toxicity. One teaspoon of sea kelp can have up to 500 times more minerals than 5 helpings of land vegetables. I used iodine therapy to detox mercury. Anything neurological (plus many other symptoms) are associated with low thyroid or heavy metal toxicity.
This is just appauling. All it amounts to is mind control and promoting the pharmaceutical industry at the expense of our young people. When will our representatives in Washington wake up – but I truly believe they don’t care as long as they get the political money. WE NEED TERM LIMITS AND THIS WILL END THIS CORRUPT MONEY IN WASHINGTON AND THE SO CALLED ” CAREER POLITICIANS”. No more extravagant pensions, healthcare benefits, and sucking off the American Taxpayer.
Schizophrenia has genetic, developmental, dietary and social causes. Some children suffer early onset before dietary or social influences contribute. It is both factually wrong and cruel to promise their parents a nutritional cure or to deny them available drugs.
Two families of dopamine receptors and at least five types of serotonin receptors must balance in the CNS. Sanity is a broad range. Anti-psychotics serve the few sufficiently unbalanced to fall off one edge or the other. Each drug has different receptor effects and should help some patients while harming others. They all offer a small benefit to all patients but only a few are a good match for each patient. Even then a second drug may need to combat side effects from the first.
The observation that fish oil offers a similar small benefit to all patients in a selected age group with a selected low severity does not suggest that it replace every drug for every patient nor does it tell the physician to cease looking for the good match. The notion that fish oil would magically find and correct every receptor imbalance without ignoring or exacerbating any is magical non-rational thinking.
Four high-risk subjects need to consume fish oil for one to benefit. Does one deny drugs to the other three because fish oil sufficed for one?
The author Felice Jacka, PhD speculated that “fish oils may be particularly effective in young people but perhaps less so after transition to a full-blown psychosis because metabolic disturbances and inflammation have progressed to the point that it might be more difficult for fatty acids to be properly incorporated into cell membranes”. She admits that “efficacy beyond the 12 month study period is unknown and it is possible that the transition to a first episode of psychosis may have been delayed rather than prevented.”
The research is positive and ongoing. A U.S./Canadian study with 130 participants was started in 2012 and expects to follow subjects for 18 months with results in 2 years. The new study sought subjects with “very early, subtle psychotic-like symptoms”, “flashes of abnormal thoughts” , “limited social skills”, “trouble at school” and “hard time coping”. It is realistic for nutritional or social interventions to keep such subjects from falling off the edge. The researchers are under no illusions that they would replace targeted drugs for patients who are already off the edge.
The information in this article is wrenchingly painful to read. Where is the Hippocratic oath in these devastating instances of subjecting children to antipsychotic drugs? “Physician, do no harm …” appears to be suffused in the easier method of containment rather than sincere and genuine treatment. Appalling.
To The Administrators of Medcaid: please give lower income children better behavioral health therapies than just putting them on anti-psychotic medicines. Please use talk therapy and other methods that work.
Dear Helth Conscious Friends,
There is no excuse for drugging our children. This is a mass murder. These idiots are killing our future for a few bucks.
We have to put an end to this.
Thank you for your efforts,
O. A.
STOP THE PATENT PROCESS!!!
It is past time to consider the elimination of the patenting of medical drugs altogether. That would remove excess profits used to buy fraudulent science, the corrupt buying of the approval process from the FDA, and the dangerous side effect problem with all medical drugs. Dangerous side effects, because patented drugs are so far removed from nature for approval that they are inherently dangerous to everyone, especially children.
Doc Blake
Where is the take action button on this issue? Where is the petition to sign? I appreciate being informed, but that is no longer enough. We need to take action.
This is something that makes my stomach turn. One could see it coming several years ago when the pharmaceutical companies began publishing and distributing charts matching diagnosis of common children behavior with the appropriate drug to “treat” it with. Many of the drugs falling into the “new” generation of anti-psychotics category.
They not only peddled these charts to doctors and physicians, but school counselors, as well.
It breaks my heart. The level humans can remove themselves from consequence never fails to shock.
Please let me know how to help bring this issue into more light. It should not be a hidden horror.
Thank you for this article. I have heard about this horrible epidemic in the U.S. Abusing our children with antipsychotic drugs is unimaginable and really no different than what is happening to children in Family Court and the Foster Care system. Our children are handed over to abusers, pedophiles and other perpetrators by judges all the time. CPS is a child’s worse nightmare as well.
HHS needs to do a lot more to help our children and to protect them against all types of abuse. This is way overdue and our children are suffering everyday! They need our help!
So thanks again for exposing this dirty little secret.
I volunteer for a well known non-profit for who advocates for abused and neglected children. Unfortunately, these children are often prescribed meds meant for adults to calm them down, make them sleep and get them out of our way. Instead of working with them in a natural, loving way to help them bring their life back to normalcy we drug them into zombies. These children need love and extra attention not drugs which dull their minds and their pain. This is an atrocity and we should not stand for it. When I first discovered this I was so upset and could not believe what we were allowing to happen to our children. These children have already been through enough and do not need to have the added insult of being drugged by the adults who should be protecting them. We should not stand for this and need to let it be known that we do not in any way agree with this. The mighty Big Pharma looks to increase their profits in any way possible, even at the expense of innocent children.
Anatomy of an Epidemic by Robert Whitaker discusses this issue in depth, and there are some jurisdictions that are doing better with emotional challenge than others, notably the Open Dialogue program in Western Lapland and the social-cooperative business model in Trieste, Italy. It is hard to talk about this subject without including the hopeful models that are doing so much better than what has become a norm in the U.S.
We need COMMUNITIES of people who mutually supoort each other to resist the overwhelming momentum of the worporations, and the wealthy who identify with them.
Excellent information. Medicaid is spending $3.8 billion to create people who will need more & more expensive treatment as they grown up and age. Psychotropics wreak havoc with both physical and mental health. In children they are often a gateway to street drugs. So, these children face a life of potentially diminished productivity yet where they will generate more and more costs.
Well done on exposing another aspect of the insidious overuse of psychotropic medications in our society.
Please consider food allergies especially wheat and all other food additives. Nutrient defincency
of D and B12. Good nutrition would help tremendouly I’m sure. We can’t medicate these tiny bodies
back to good health.
Why don’t you have an easy forwarding link to these articles and you might get those to whom we forward subscribe?
Hi Garry–Thanks for your comment! I encourage you to use the “Share” buttons, located on this webpage directly between the article text and the comments section. Thanks again for reading! -ANH-USA
i totally agree with you. as a psychiatric nurse pracitioner, these meds are aweful. Provider and MaineCare, Maine’s medicaid system is award of this. Yet, i still get kids for whom antipsychotics were used first, before trying even less offensive psychiatric meds.
it is so true that more healing modalities, often just basics are so not underfunded..
carin
What these kids need are vitamins called “Empower” by Truehope.com. They work and there is no need for these serious antipsychotic drugs. So sad that we spend so much money on toxic drugs and don’t explore the natural remedies that can cure many so called “metal” illnesses. Kudos to Truehope and their battle to keep these vitamins available to the public. So glad we found them for our child.
What is needed is more light , love and better care for all of our most vulnerable citizens. This is everyone’s responsibility. Hugs and caring human contact cost nothing and have such long lasting value.Perhaps those that advocate for use of these drugs for foster children should run a trial on themselves first to determine efficacy instead of hurting children like this.
Cocaine would work as well . . . certainly in the same ballpark relative to the approach being taken. Just becuase it’s state-sponsored drugs, it’s still drugs (that most assuredly supports profits of the Big Pharma Cartel, could that possibly have something to do with this?). Duh.
Thank you for making the facts known about the dangers of Psychiatric Drugs, and the reason for their proliferation, i.e. profits for the drug companies… and the more efficient and effective remedies such as proper nutrition. Well done!!!
These dangerous, and even deadly drugs are totally unnecessary – – the only ones benefitting are the drug companies, who profit greatly from the sale of these toxic drugs. THIS MUST STOP!!!
I suspect that some of the few physicians willing to treat those on Medicaid might be finding ways to make up the financial shortfall elsewhere. My autistic, mute adult son has been on these psychotropic drugs since his early teens. It seems to me that he has gotten worse with the drugs. I have done all I can do to discourage their use and increase testing frequency to monitor blood levels and prevent neural damage. But as he is in a care program that he must have, I am limited in what I can do. I do know that Prozac was the drug that raise his blood serotonin level sky high and started his seizures that have ever since required anticonvulsant meds too.
Wouldn’t looking a nutritional deficiencies and issues such as food allergies (dairy or gluten), and underlying infection such as yeast be better than all these drugs. There is good testing available to help with diagnosis but the problem is Medicaid does not pay for them. Wouldn’t it be more cause effective to look for underlying causes and correct them before jumping into drugs. What about diet—all the sugar and junk food many children eat. The list goes on–parasites?
I worked at a foster care agency that served children with “special needs” and witnessed 1st hand the number of drugs the children were taking. Never saw any indication that their blood levels were monitored as they should be. The head of the agency wanted to take the agency in a new direction by finding foster parents who would be willing to try a dietary approach and to set up a horticultural therapy program as well as other alternative therapies that were showing signs of progress especially for some of the Autistic children. The foster board decided instead to fire the founder and CEO of the agency and to replace him with the cousin of the chairman of the board and “get back to basics” i.e. drug them up.
This is not surprising. Physicians operate more and more by just throwing prescriptions at patients with very little knowledge of the drugs or their side effects. Pushed by big drug companies and getting most, if not all of their information from them, no real effort needs to be made. I Have ppersonally seen a huge amount f incompetence in medicine both in care I”ve received and the experiences of many others that I know, and these Dos continue to pull in big paychecks.
These statistics speak for themselves. Following the trail back to funding by political alliances in the pharmcy business is very revealing. Let’s do something about this transgression to tthe children who are our future.
Very misleading. You could give omegas to someone with bipolar until the cows came home and it likely wouldn’t help enough. Bipolar is not the same as mild anxiety or depression. It’s dangerous NOT to treat it! In suicide risk and other ways.
The title of this article is incredibly misleading and really downright false. Medicare is not doing anything with these drugs other than approving payment. Medicare (or any other form of insurance) does not prescribe drugs. Doctors prescribe drugs. The title should read “Doctors are Drowning Our Kids with Medicaid in Toxic Psychiatric Drugs!”
And all the other adults involved!
All our children are considered “research partners” for psychotropic drugs. All parents are considered “research partners” for psychotropic drugs. All people are considered “research partners” for psychotropic drugs. Per law, such “research partners” must be given informed consent. This is not being done. Every doctor who prescribes these drugs without informed consent – FULLY explaining the side effects (not the blue pharmacy sheet), explaining the alternatives, and explaining the side effects of the alternatives, must be formally reported to the licensing body. In Ontario, it is the College of Physicians and Surgeons. All appeals should be filed to all boards involved. Kill this unlawful activity with a lawful activity – death by a thousand paper cuts. If the doctor has died, file it anyway as death does not release a doctor from the liability. The doctor’s family will have to take the brunt. Any appeal to government is a waste of time as government as heavily invested in the drugging of the population since 1971. They have proclaimed and are pursuing their “payback”.
When are people going to wake up and realise that they want to keep the kids drugged so they are more compliant and the big Pharma companies can continue to make massive amounts of profits? It’s not just the kids, but the adults are drugged as well! They advertise on TV??? Come on, can it be any more obvious? There is no profit in health.
Antipsychotic drugs are life shortening. My child needed to be on one after reaching her late twenties. The Drs. warned that it shortened the life span, but didn’t say how much. She only lived to age 52. However it was better to have an enjoyable and manageable life than than the alternative.
It should be avoided until it is the only choice left. Young children can be managed other ways.
the title should read “stupid parents that are not paying attention to their kids are drugging up their kids so they don’t have to deal with the numerous changes in behaviour, such as the terrible twos.”
if you don’t want to deal with your kids, you should not have had them.
Just STOP this greedy, insane attack on innocent kids and unaware parents!
The simple truth is there is no scientific basis for ANY Psychiatric Drug.
Just like “vaccination” it is a Rothschild/Rockefeller/HHS concocted LIE. Your brain and the brain of your child does not need ANY drug it needs nutrition and your bodies need LOVE. We are increasingly finding NEITHER in our Medical Industries and government “regulated” agencies.
August 28, 2013
Dear ANH-USA :
Kipp says:
August 28, 2013 at 9:59 am
The title of this article is incredibly misleading and really downright false. Medicare is not doing anything with these drugs other than approving payment. Medicare (or any other form of insurance) does not prescribe drugs. Doctors prescribe drugs. The title should read “Doctors are Drowning Our Kids with Medicaid in Toxic Psychiatric Drugs!”
Kipp’s comment is absolutely correct. The psychotic, drug pushing doctors are the ones putting these kids on dangerous psychiatric drugs, which is a massive criminal act. Criminal to an adult; far more criminal to a defenseless child. I hope that ANH-USA is aware of the fact that this reckless, criminal Psychiatric Dangerous Drug Pushing has been going on for 59 years now since 1954 when Thorazine was first put on the market by drug companies who gave suitcases of money to USA state legislatures to get the drug pushed by USA state mental ” hospitals “. ; which are now largely shut down as a result of the drug atrocities that went on there. The drug companies, like Crack Dealers, simply moved on to:
1. ” Community Mental Health Centers ”
2. halfway houses
3. jails, prisons
4. public schools
5. and now the Military
And now you see the result.: The USA has the unhealthiest population in the World with obesity, cancer and chronic disease at an all time high. Our literacy rate has plummeted.
Just one example of these psych. drug atrocities is Tardive Dyskinesia. It was known by scientists to occur in people on psychiatric drugs as far back as 1957. There was an FDA warning on every phenothiazine drug product information sheet starting in 1972. TD causes uncontrollable facial muscular movements; turning the victims face into ” a grotesque rubbery mask ” as described by the National Enquirer in 1974. Which in not an exaggeration; I have seen it myself. This article mentions only a tiny fraction of adverse reactions of psych. drugs. There are a couple of hundred adverse reactions for each and every one of the psych. drugs and the major tranquilizers, antidepressants and anti-Parkinsonian drugs are all highly toxic categories of chemicals. Tardive Dyskinesia is a form of permanent brain damage caused by long term use of, usually forced, phenothiazine drugs and is completely incurable. If that is not an atrocity, I don’t know what is.
After 59 years of nothing being done…
August 28, 2013
Dear ANH-USA:
As I was saying in my last comment, after 59 years of nothing being done about this government run Psychiatric Drug Pushing Atrocity, it seems the only reason this article brings this up now is because Medicaid Money is being wasted to commit the atrocities. Well, if that is what it takes to get people angry, so be it. But if ANH-USA wants real justice on this case, Psychiatric Dangerous Drug Pushing Doctors need to be put in prison for life or more properly get the death penalty for these crimes because the number of dead victims is much more than 1 million Worldwide by now and the number of injured victims, well over 100 million by now, according to Citizen’s Committee on Human Rights and over 500 million by my estimate. ( Based on 1/4 million Phenothiazine victims as of 1974 according to New England Journal of Medicine. )
yours truly,
Roger Fuller
WHY?
I’ve worked for ACS and I know that some foster parents request drugs for their foster children because the agency will classify the children as special needs. Then the foster parent would be entitled to special rate money is far mare than the rate a healthy child would receive. Also, school-aged children who are classified as needing special education are drugged to make it easy for school personnel to manage them in a school. There’s no yearly or quarterly evaluations done to determine whether the child’s condition has improved or deteriorated so the child is being given these drugs with no end in sight. And don’t forget the children who have cases in family court. a significant number of the children who commit offenses are on psychotropic medication. Unfortunately, it’s the state of the world we live in today.
names such as Abilify (which is the nation’s top-selling prescription drug (where’s the source for this? I can only find it at number 4, Lipitor occupying the number 1 spot.)
wrong spot for that comment. sorry. can’t figure out how to remove it.
The kids in foster care often have far more trauma in their short little lives than we realize – having experienced sexual violations, physical abuse, life-threats, witnessing abuse, getting bullied, and any number of other traumas. The Adverse Childhood Experiences scale (google it) followed hundreds of survivors of adverse childhood experiences for 20+ years and correlated adult physical-and-mental health & behavior difficulties to how much, how bad, how often the individual had been traumatized as a child. ADHD, “bi-polar” (often misdiagnosed), behavior difficulties, etc., are often the symptoms of PTSD. We acknowledge it in men who return from Iraq & Afghanistan – but not in small children. If proven psychotherapy interventions for PTSD were included in the care of these children, we could heal the PTSD, decrease adult physical, emotional, and behavioral issues, decrease prison population, decrease drug addiction, and decrease dependency on medications. but, of course Big Pharma would not like to see their drugs used less, nor would they really want to see genuine improvements in persons’ conditions – b/c that, too, would, in turn, mean….ta-da!….less sales of medications. The interventions that work include EMDR & Somatic Experiencing, along with responsible & skilled play therapy and/or art therapy – anything that gets beyond the merely verbal.
I no sooner hit Submit Comment, than the next thing I read on line, is this article!
http://www.marketplace.org/topics/economy/health-care/getting-know-sickest-patients
I’ve been saying for well over a decade, stop drugging our kids. We never hear about what “medicine” all of the ‘shooters’ have been on and/or have stopped taking. Never. They don’t talk about the drugs… they only talk about guns and video games. Don’t tell me that Medical Examination of these boys don’t tell something we’re not being told.
People, Big Pharma is not your friend.
August 29, 2013
Dear ANH-USA:
I just want to correct an error in my statistics in my last comment. I said 1/4 million phenothiazine victims. I meant to say that there were 1/4 BILLION victims of phenothiazine drugs in the first 20 years of their use, ( mostly forced ), worldwide, according to the New England Journal of Medecine in 1974.
yours truly,
Roger Fuller
I was a foster parent for seven years. It is not just parents that are guilty. A friend who was also a case worker quit working for Dept. of Children and Families in Florida because she went to court trying to get a chemical cocktail (many drugs) lowered in two young boys who were wards of the state. When she presented her information to the judge he ripped her to shreds in the court room. That was the end of her career in this area because she had no voice and the system would not allow these two boys to get their medications lowered. Behind the scenes attorneys and administrators (psychiatrists) are implementing these programs. The case workers have no say what so ever.
My daughter had cancer and subsequent treatment of 2.5 years. The doctors are all too ready to prescribe prescriptions for any depression at all. I learned the hard way to present a happy face no matter what we were going through as I did not want psychotropic drugs added to our incredibly hard regimen of chemo, antibiotics and narcotics for pain. We did get through without these drugs but it was not easy!
Do not be too quick to judge parents. The whole system is flawed when it comes to this subject with decades of brainwashing propaganda disseminated through all media outlets. After a while most people start to believe the hogwash about chemical imbalances in the brain, etc. Remember Goebbles, the best Nazi PR man- said it best “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it.”
Vested interests will always try to suppress information that would free people from their clutches.
I was a foster mother. The child originally lived with my next door neighbor. The child was there for several years, and thrived under their care. Unfortunately, the couple retired, then this child went from foster home to foster home. By the time I got my license and she came into my home she was on 7 different psychotic medications, where she was on none in the neighbors home. She was a whole different child medicated.
Hi could it be doctors that accept Medicaid are required to do this? I have had Private and Medicaid with share of cost. I have had a bad experience every time with a Doctor that accepts Medicaid.
I also have a medically needed child and have been able to monitor their care with Medicaid and Private. I have noted the same thing you’re treated better and differently with Private Insurance!
I had a medical staff member at the Doctor ‘s office. That tried to report me to the CPA Child Protection Agency because of Insurance issues with Medicaid. The requirements and referrals where not being meet do to Medicaid Changing Policies. Now what I have notice is that because of the huge job losses in the country more Americans are on Medicaid for the kids. That Doctors office tune changed because I was not the few that had Medicaid but NOW one of the many!
I think many Americans are going to find themselves on Medicaid type of Obama Care. I looked up my own cost and for my age over thirty under fifty it’s nearly four hundred a month. That does not include my children.
Medicaid is not over medicating children it is the Doctors’ we are all being medical stereotype. I had no medical expenses that were not paid for through my Private Insurance nor my Share of Cost through Medicaid when I was eligible.
Now I will be stuck with a monthly Insurance Premium and possible face a Penalty. One thing is for sure I may not be able to afford four hundred dollars a month. So I will more in likely qualify for some short order form of Medicaid; Obama Care which the level of care is extremely poor!
The whole foundation of drugging relies on the false criterion set out in the DSM, Diagnostic and Statistical Manual. When one is given one of these labels which are pinned on without ANY laboratory evidence then it legitamizes the drugging with psychotropics which essentially kill mitochondria, lead to long term health problems, more psychiatric labels and on and on. The new DSM V just came out. WHY oh WHY???!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Probably funded by the drug pushers.
Congress sleeps while the FDA and CDC perpetuate this poisoning of Americans and the world.
Prior to any diagnosis there needs to be an established lab protocol that distinguishes dysfunctional states. Most of these dysfunctions are directly related to some form of malabsorption/malnutrition or substance sensitivities, etc. Doctors continue to ignore the epidemic of low thyroid which then allows them to poison people rather than treat the thyroid. Iodine deficiency is rampant. Zinc deficiency is rampant. Fast food and vaccinations create illness like the plague. And that is exactly what we have.
Medicaid eligible children often have parents who do not provide quality nutrition but allow their children to eat junk foods. This sets up the depletion of zinc and other minerals and nutrients. The parents have these depletions as well and can’t think straight. Its a viscious cycle that is not easily dealt with. The parents are not trainable because they believe it is the kid’s problem. Lately we have an added problem with children whose parents are addicted to texting, Facebook, SmartPhones and everything EXCEPT communicating with children. So the children are neglected and abandoned even though parents are in the same household.
This whole scenario adds another layer of the epidemic that afflicts the Medicaid population.
Student see nothing wrong with the lack of vegetables and quality foods.
Compromised parents raise compromised children and both are victimized by a mercenary medical money machine which is driven by drug pushers. Vaccines are NOT ok. Psychotropic drugs are poisonous and will ruin health and mental health and well being.
Schools, buy into this series of lies and participate in vaccine programs. County mental health systems float their whole boat based on the drugging of their clients. County mental health get automatic payments from Medicaid to provide services. The drug bill per state per month for just those on county mental health is around…
sorry, posted in wrong spot earlier but where’s the source for this info please? “names such as Abilify (which is the nation’s top-selling prescription drug”
Well people, I am one who tells my doctor, who is my cousin in law what meds to prescribe for me, and I do my research. For instance, Licinopril, was being given to me, which caused my blood pressure to fluctuate, and stay very high. He put me in the hospital for test, and I also told him I did not want meds that were going to make me sway to and fro, since I am a singer and am on stage in front of a myriad of fans, he custom made my meds. The problem with clinics and the such is that they give everyone the same meds, and don’t research anything, YOU HAVE TO DO YOUR OWN research. Children should not be put on meds of any kind only if they absolutely need them, after test, after test, after test. Nothing should be taken for granted. I am so lucky that I have a doctor who talks to me and I tell him what I need and he listens. I have Medicare and this has nothing to do with who administers my drug care. It is with the individual, and yes the title of this article is very misleading. My doctor is also an internist, which is quite different than a general practitioner.
Antipsychotics have high noncompliance rates. Medicaid pays for 70% of antipsychotics. They are wasting our tax dollars.
Jani Schofield and Briana Schaffer are young children diagnosed with the rare childhood onset schizophrenia both girls used antipsychotics. Schizophrenia is a harmless disease. Schizophrenics have low rates of suicide and homicide. In fact most murderers are not schizophrenic. Many times violent criminals like Ted Kaczynsky, Jared Loughner, Kip Kinkel, and Izola Ware Curry were diagnosed with schizophrenia only after they committed these crimes.
I am one of these victims. when i was six i was diagnosed as “bipolar” by a psychiatrist in texas who’s name is Dr. Jay Tarnow, Dr. Tarnow is a specialist in childhood bipolar disorder used me and many other children as guinea pigs by testing medications that were clearly for adults to see the effects on children, he used the desperate pleas of the parents who at this point in time many people had never heard of childhood bipolar disorder, he used their illknowlage of the disease to be able to “treat” them. i am now 20 and have no memory of my childhood due to the medication i was put on along with other health problems, i finally stopped seeing Dr. Tarnow in the 8th grade. I started meeting with a new psychiatrist who has helped me get on the right medications. i am posting this on many other sites i am hoping to find other people who have also been treated by dr. tarnow and have had a similar experience, preferable those in their early to mid 20s. if there is anyone out there please comment any information is helpful.
Hi Kimberlee, I am a reporter/producer doing a story on children being prescribed antipsychotic and antidepressant medication. I would love to talk to you about your experience. If you are interested, please reach out to me at [email protected]