Talking Points on Mental Health Initiatives
http://www.changingworldviews.com/GuestCommentaries/karenreffremarticle3.htm
Talking Points on Mental Health Initiatives
Problems with Screening and Drugging
Eliminate funding for the following reasons:
1) Screening does not prevent suicide - The U.S. Preventive Services
Task Force (USPSTF) issued its findings and recommendation against
screening for suicide that corroborate those of the Canadian PSTF.
"USPSTF found no evidence that screening for suicide risk reduces
suicide attempts or mortality. There is limited evidence on the
accuracy of screening tools to identify suicide risk in the primary
care setting, including tools to identify those at high risk. (See
http://www.ahrp.org/infomail/04/05/21.html).
2) Mental health diagnoses are "subjective" and "social
constructions" as admitted by the authors of the diagnostic manuals
themselves. Both the World Health Organization and the Surgeon General
reports say that it is especially difficult to accurately diagnose
young children because they are so rapidly changing and developing.
This is particularly relevant to our opposition to the Foundations for
Learning Act within No Child Left Behind, section 5542 (USC 20,
sec.7269a).
3) Parents are already being coerced to put their children on
psychiatric medications and some children are dying because of it.
Universal screening and the accompanying treatments recommended by the
New Freedom Commission will only increase that problem. Across the
country, Patricia Weathers, the Carroll Family, the Johnston Family,
and the Salazar Family were all charged or threatened with child abuse
charges for refusing or taking their children off of psychiatric
medications. Both Matthew Smith and Shaina Dunkle died of medication
toxicity after their parents were coerced to place their children on
drugs by the schools. What are the rights of youth and their parents to
refuse or opt out of this screening? Will they face coercion and
threats of removal from school or child abuse/neglect charges if they
refuse? How reliable are the screening instruments? What if the
diagnosis is wrong? How will a child or adolescent remove a
stigmatizing label from their records that could follow them the rest
of their lives? Will parents be honestly told about the potentially
severe side effects of the medications used in treatment? There are no
studies on the long-term effects of any of these drugs on the brains of
children, especially in the 2 to 4 year old children that are
increasingly being put on these drugs and more is being spent on them
than on antibiotics. (http://www.ahrp.org/infomail/04/05/25.html)
4) Most psychiatric medications do not work in children - Medical
textbooks, published and unpublished research, and government reports
consistently state that the long term safety and effectiveness of
antidepressants like Prozac and stimulants like Ritalin have yet to be
proven.
5) The side effects of these medications in children are severe -
They include suicide and violence from the new antidepressants; cardiac
(heart) toxicity from the older antidepressants; growth suppression,
psychosis, and violence from stimulants; and diabetes from the newer
anti-psychotic medications. Several school shooters, like Eric Harris
(Columbine), Kip Kinkel (Oregon), and Jason Hoffman (San Diego) were on
antidepressants or stimulants or both at the time of their crimes.
(For detailed references for points 2-5, see
http://www.edaction.org/2003/030827.htm)
6) Merging screening with the academic standards required by No Child
Left Behind, as is happening in Illinois, will lead to diagnosis for
political reasons. A school violence prevention program funded by the
federal government called "Early Warning, Timely Response" lists
"intolerance for others and prejudicial attitudes" as an early
warning sign for violence and mental instability, saying, "All
children have likes and dislikes. However, an intense prejudice toward
others based on racial, ethnic, religious, language, gender, sexual
orientation, ability, and physical appearance when coupled with
other factors may lead to violent assaults against those who are
perceived to be different." (See http://edaction.org/2004/080204.htm)
The Phoenix office of the FBI put out a pamphlet for their joint
counterterrorism operations that said that people who are "defenders
of the US Constitution against federal government and the UN" and
"make numerous references to the US Constitution" should be
monitored as potential murderous and fanatical terrorists, by
extension, considered mentally unstable.
(http://www.keepandbeararms.com/newsarchives/XcNewsPlus.asp?cmdview&articleid2126)
7) Physicians and the public are rapidly losing confidence in the
validity of scientific research because the FDA has allowed the
pharmaceutical industry to withhold data not favorable to their
products.
(http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/news/editorial/9401899.htm?templatecontentModules/printstory.jsp)
(http://www.ahrp.org/infomail/04/08/13.html;
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A58130-2004Jan28?languageprinter);
The FDA also suppressed the testimony of its medical officer Dr. Andrew
Mosholder at a February hearing when he found that children on the
newer antidepressants were nearly twice as likely as have suicidal
ideation or commit suicide than children on placebo. After paying for
another study at taxpayer expense, Dr. Mosholders findings were
confirmed. (http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/20/science/20depress.html)
It is now nearly a year since Britain banned the use of all of the SSRI
antidepressants in children except Prozac, and all that the FDA has
done is issue a caution to monitor people on these drugs more closely.
If data is withheld about the dangers or lack of effectiveness of the
new psychiatric drugs, why should physicians believe and carry out the
recommendations of the New Freedom Commission for treatment, such as
the Texas Medication Algorithm Project (TMAP) that uses those drugs as
paid for the state incentive grants?
8) The untoward influence by the pharmaceutical industry, or at least
the appearance of impropriety, is abundantly clear in two important
aspects of this issue. First, "...Dr. Peter J Weiden, who was a
member of the projects [TMAP] expert consensus panel, charges that the
guidelines are based on opinions, not data and that bias due to
funding sources undermines the credibility of the guidelines since
most of the guidelines authors have received support from the
pharmaceutical industry.
(http://bmj.bmjjournals.com/cgi/content/full/bmj;328/7449/1153) In
addition, just when the US House was to investigate the drug company
role in suppressing negative data and the FDAs handling of the
Mosholder report, the chairman of the subcommittee, James Greenwood
(R-PA) abruptly "postponed" the hearing, decided he would not seek
re-election, and went to work with a lobbying organization that works
for the very companies he was to investigate. (
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A106-2004Jul20?languageprinter)
The recommendations of the New Freedom Commission should not be carried
out and paid for with tax dollars in the state incentive transformation
grants until the level of drug company corruption of FDA policies and
Congress is thoroughly investigated.