Too Many Missouri Children Drugged for ADHD

Posted on March 12, 2013 by cchrstl

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (www.cdc.gov) analyzes and publishes statistics for various conditions. A January 24, 2013 CDC research survey [“State-Based and Demographic Variation in Parent-Reported Medication Rates for Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder, 2007–2008”] reports that Missouri had the second-highest number of children in the nation who are prescribed ADHD drugs.

The actual statistic is that in 2007-2008 Missouri had the second highest rate, 78.3%, of children aged 4 to 17 years who had an ADHD diagnosis and were taking ADHD drugs. Only Mississippi with 79.0% was higher.

Of U.S. children aged 4 to 17 years, 4.1 million had a current ADHD diagnosis in 2007, and approximately 2.7 million were taking ADHD medication. The average rate by state was 66.3% of children having an ADHD diagnosis and taking ADHD drugs. Missouri comprised 6.7% of the national total of children diagnosed with ADHD and taking ADHD drugs.

Should we be worried that such a large percentage of children are being diagnosed and drugged for ADHD? You bet!

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported on this survey February 4th, saying that the CDC is working with the Missouri Department of Mental Health to determine why this rate is so high. Email your concerns about psychiatric drugging of children to Patsy Carter (patsy.carter@dmh.mo.gov) in the Office of Children, Division of Comprehensive Psychiatric Services, Missouri Department of Mental Health. You might want to mention that ADHD is a fraudulent diagnosis, and that psychiatric drugs are harmful and addictive.

The ADHD diagnosis does not identify a genuine biological or psychological disorder. The diagnosis, from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, is simply a list of behaviors that may appear disruptive or inappropriate.

These are the spontaneous behaviors of normal children. When these behaviors become age-inappropriate, excessive or disruptive, the potential causes are limitless, including: boredom, poor teaching, illiteracy, inconsistent discipline at home, tiredness, malnutrition, and underlying physical illness. Children who are suffering from bullying, abuse or stress may also display these behaviors in excess. By making an ADHD diagnosis, we ignore and stop looking for what is really going on with the child. ADHD may also be Teacher Attention Disorder or Parent Attention Disorder. These children need the adults in their lives to give them improved attention.

Go here for more information about the fraudulent ADHD diagnosis.

Go here for more information about ADHD drug side effects.

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More About Presidential Memoranda

Posted on March 1, 2013 by cchrstl

In a previous newsletter, we discussed what at the time were being called Presidential Executive Orders regarding gun violence. One of these has now shown up on the Whitehouse web site as a Presidential Memorandum rather than an Executive Order.

In any case, we thought you might be interested in more detail about this issue and how it might relate to the purpose and mission of Citizens Commission on Human Rights.

Following are selected quotes from this Presidential Memoranda and the White House web page devoted to preventing gun violence — which is located at http://www.whitehouse.gov/issues/preventing-gun-violence.

Presidential Memorandum “Engaging in Public Health Research on the Causes and Prevention of Gun Violence”, January 16, 2013:

“The Secretary of Health and Human Services (Secretary), through the Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other scientific agencies within the Department of Health and Human Services, shall conduct or sponsor research into the causes of gun violence and the ways to prevent it.”

From the White House web page on preventing gun violence:

“Though the vast majority of Americans with a mental illness are not violent, we need to do more to identify mental health issues early and help individuals get the treatment they need before dangerous situations develop. As President Obama has said, ‘We are going to need to work on making access to mental health care as easy as access to a gun.’ The Administration is proposing steps to identify mental health issues early and help individuals get the treatment they need before these dangerous situations develop.”

If you have information about the causes of gun violence and ways to prevent it, please send it to:

Secretary HHS in care of Kathleen.Sebelius@hhs.gov

Director CDC in care of Tomfrieden@cdc.gov

You might want to mention that important and often neglected causes of violence are psychotropic drugs, whose violence-causing side effects are already documented by the Food and Drug Administration; and that the way to prevent it is to simply stop taking these drugs (but do not stop taking these drugs suddenly, as the violence caused by withdrawal symptoms are just as deadly as violence caused by taking the drugs in the first place.) For evidence, go to the FDA’s web site www.fda.gov and search for “black box warning antidepressant” — for example, the increased risk of suicidal thoughts and behavior in children and adolescents being treated with antidepressant drugs.

For more information about the relation between violence, suicide and psychotropic drugs, download and read the booklet “Psychiatry and the Creation of Senseless Violence” from the CCHR St. Louis web site.

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Stigma

Posted on February 13, 2013 by cchrstl

What is a “stigma”?

A mark or characteristic indicative of a history of a disease or abnormality. [Middle English stigme, brand, from Latin stigma, stigmat-, tattoo indicating slave or criminal status, from Greek, tattoo mark, from stizein, stig-, to prick]

Is there a stigma associated with mental distress? First of all, the psychiatric manifestation known as “mental illness” is not a disease, it’s a symptom. And let’s face it, what a psychiatrist calls “abnormal” is just a label for something they don’t like.

Thomas Szasz proposed in 1960 that we view the phenomena conventionally called “mental diseases” as simply behaviors that disturb others (or oneself.)

So how do you fix disturbing behavior? Do you suppress it with drugs, involuntary commitment, restraints, surgery, or electric shock?

Or do you actually handle it by finding and treating the root cause, whatever that may be?

The campaign to “stop the stigma” of mental illness is a pharmaceutical marketing campaign.

With its seemingly altruistic sounding agenda to eliminate “stigma” the fact is the real “stigmatization” is coming from those behind this campaign — pharma, psychiatry and pharma-funded front groups such as NAMI and CHADD. For example, take NAMI’s campaign to stop the “stigma” and “end discrimination” against the mentally ill — the “Founding Sponsors” were Abbott Labs, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Eli Lilly, Janssen, Pfizer, Novartis, SmithKline Beecham and Wyeth-Ayerst Labs.

The real stigmatization is coming from those that benefit from labeling behaviors as diseases to be “cured” or “treated” despite the complete lack of medical/biological evidence to support them.

Psychiatric labels are the stigma.

The forthcoming 2013 revision of the Diagnostic & Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) will increase the number of people in the general population diagnosed with a mental illness — but what they need is help and understanding, not labels and medication.

Fraudulent diagnoses perpetrated by the DSM obscure the role of family, drug abuse, undiagnosed and untreated medical conditions, nutritional deficiencies, stress, illiteracy, and other factors contributing to mental distress. The result is often further stigma, discrimination and social exclusion.

What shall we do about this? How about labeling jars instead of people?

CCHR: Psychiatry Labeling Kids with
Bogus ‘Mental Disorders’

Watch the Video
****.
3992 ratings		726,680
views
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The Military’s Billion-Dollar Pill Problem

Posted on February 9, 2013 by cchrstl

A recent article in Men’s Journal magazine by Paul John Scott presents a vivid human interest story about the damage that psychiatric drugs are doing in the U.S. Military.

“At a time when soldiers kill themselves in record numbers – 18 veterans per day – the armed forces spend a fortune on a drug known to increase the chance of suicide.”

The article goes on to say —

“American soldiers (active soldiers as well as retired) have never been more medicated than they are now: In 2010, more than 213,000 service members (roughly 20 percent of active-duty military) were taking medications the military considered “high risk” – from epilepsy drugs to psychiatric pills like Seroquel. But what’s more incredible is that Seroquel and other antipsychotics are expensive (as much as $10 a dose) and not proven to be effective in treating the very conditions for which the military and VA most often prescribe them: insomnia and PTSD. But that didn’t prevent their use by the military from increasing tenfold between 2002 and 2009.”

and

“…80 percent of soldiers with PTSD are given psychotropic drugs, many of which can raise the risk of suicide.”

and

“While the military is doling out all kinds of psychiatric drugs, none is more troubling than the atypical antipsychotics – blockbuster drugs with names like Seroquel, Risperdal, Zyprexa, Geodon, and Abilify. According to 2010 Department of Defense records, about 11,000 active-duty troops were on Seroquel. Since 2001, the VA has spent more than $1.5 billion and the Department of Defense more than $88 million on two atypicals alone, Seroquel and Risperdal.”

Please thank the article’s author by leaving him a message here.

Read more about drugging in the military here.

You can have a voice in this waste and abuse. Here are places you can express your outrage:

Secretary of Defense
1000 Defense Pentagon
Washington, DC 20301-1000
dpcintrn@osd.pentagon.mil

Department of Defense
Office of Inspector General
4800 Mark Center Drive
Alexandria, VA 22350-1500
hotline@dodig.mil

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
9999 Joint Staff Pentagon
Washington, DC 20318-9999
jointstaffig@js.pentagon.mil

Secretary of the Army
101 Army Pentagon
Washington, DC 20310-0101
usarmy.pentagon.hqda-oaa.mbx.oaa-communications-poc@mail.mil

Secretary of the Navy
1000 Navy Pentagon
Washington, DC 20350-1000
ray.mabus@navy.mil

Secretary of the Air Force
1670 Air Force Pentagon
Washington, DC 20330-1670
http://www.af.mil/main/contactus.asp

Commandant of the Marine Corps
Headquarters USMC
2 Navy Annex (CMC)
Washington, DC 20380-1775
marine.mail.fct@usmc.mil

Department of Veterans Affairs
VA Inspector General Hotline (53E)
P.O. BOX 50410
WASHINGTON, DC 20091-0410
vaoighotline@va.gov

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Pill Mill Psychiatrist Disciplined

Posted on February 5, 2013 by cchrstl

Effective February 1, 2013, the Medical Board of California placed psychiatrist Nathan Brian Kuemmerle on seven years’ probation, with an actual one year suspension beginning February 17, 2013.

Kuemmerle, who formerly practiced in West Hollywood, was charged with operating a “pill mill” out of his office: writing thousands of narcotics prescriptions for cash, without examining patients.

On May 18, 2011, Nathan Kuemmerle was sentenced in Los Angeles federal court to time served and three years probation, following his January conviction on one charge of distribution of a controlled substance—specifically, 180 tablets of Xanax.

Investigations revealed that Kuemmerle was the number one prescriber of the most powerful dosage of the stimulant drug Adderall in the state of California and the second-highest prescriber of Schedule II controlled substances (the designation used by the federal Drug Enforcement Administration for drugs of greatest danger, addiction and abuse).

Kuemmerle is reported to have written prescriptions for cash, without legitimate medical purposes, to make money to pay for his addiction to methamphetamine.

The Medical Board of California placed conditions on Kuemmerle upon his return to practice: He is prohibited from supervising physician assistants, engaging in the solo act of medicine, and shall not order, prescribe, dispense, administer, furnish, or possess any controlled substances; and, shall not issue an oral or written recommendation or approval to a patient for possession or cultivation of marijuana for personal medical purposes.

YOU CAN HELP spread the word about psychiatric fraud and abuse. Watch the CCHR documentary DVDs and show them to your family, friends, and associates. The fraud is real, the abuse is real, and the truth is real scary – but something can always be done about it. Don’t wait for someone else to do something about it!

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Missouri Legislative News

Posted on January 27, 2013 by cchrstl

Follow the Missouri legislature at www.moga.mo.gov (Missouri General Assembly) and find out how to contact your own Missouri state representative here.

We wanted to tell you about proposed legislation that we think deserves your support. Please contact your Missouri state representative in support of this bill.

(If you do not live and vote in Missouri, then suggest to your own state representative to introduce similar legislation in your state.)

House Bill 287

Introduced by Rep. John McCaherty (Republican, District 97 – Jefferson County) and co-sponsored by Rep’s Higdon, Crawford, Lauer, Cross and Richardson.

This bill extends the statute of limitations for liability of licensed mental health practitioners to five years, from the two years currently provided in RSMo (Revised Statutes of Missouri) chapter 516.105.

Quoting from the proposed bill: “All actions against mental health professionals licensed under chapter 337 for damages for malpractice, negligence, error or mistake related to mental health care shall be brought within five years from the date of occurrence of the act of neglect complained of; except that, in cases in which the person bringing the action is a minor less than eighteen years of age, such minor shall have until his or her twenty-third birthday to bring such action.”</>

We think this bill is a good thing because of the significant amount of fraud and abuse in the mental health care industry.

Contacting your state representative about this proposed legislation is an important civic duty, and is a valuable grass roots action that you can perform. Feel free to forward this newsletter to all your family, friends, and associates in Missouri. Let us know about what you did and any responses you get.</>

You can review hints about how to write to your legislators here.

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Presidential Executive Orders Empower Psychiatry

Posted on January 20, 2013 by cchrstl

On January 16, 2013, President Barack Obama said, “I will sign a directive giving law enforcement, schools, mental health professionals and the public health community some of the tools they need to help reduce gun violence.” The President went on to sign 23 executive orders implementing various aspects of this vision.

At the time of writing this newsletter, these executive orders have not yet been posted to the White House web site. However, we do know the general subject matter of several that readers of this newsletter may find of interest.

#14. Issue a Presidential Memorandum directing the Centers for Disease Control to research the causes and prevention of gun violence.

#20. Release a letter to state health officials clarifying the scope of mental health services that Medicaid plans must cover.

#22. Commit to finalizing mental health parity regulations.

#23. Launch a national dialogue led by Secretaries Sebelius and Duncan on mental health.

Occasionally, someone asks me why CCHR does not get rid of harmful mental health laws such as involuntary commitment or mental health insurance parity, or why CCHR has not replaced abusive psychiatric drug treatment with something that actually works, or why CCHR does not run hospitals where the mentally traumatized can recover in peace. My standard answer is, what are you doing to help get these things done?

CCHR depends on your grass roots participation: your volunteer work, your calls and letters to your legislators, your donations. It’s hard for most people to imagine the magnitude of the opposition to a sane and effective mental health system. Witness the Executive Orders described above: let’s just put more taxpayer money into the hands of the psychiatric mental health industry, who have already been proven to make matters worse, not better.

Are you interested in expressing your own points of view to the President, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services—Kathleen Sebelius, and Secretary of the U.S. Department of Education—Arne Duncan? Feel free to let them know what you think; let us know what you said and if you got a response. You can find talking points about the violence and suicide caused by psychiatric drugs, for example, by clicking here.

Show the CCHR documentary DVDs to your family, your friends, your school boards, your religious groups, your civic organizations. You don’t have to prepare a speech – you only have to show a DVD; that’s why they were made, for broad public dissemination. Don’t count on CCHR showing them to your associates; that’s what CCHR is counting on from you! If you need a copy of a DVD, let us know — we can at least help you with that.

CCHR St. Louis will have an exhibit at the Missouri State Capitol Building Rotunda in Jefferson City (February 4-5), and at the Working Women’s Survival Show in St. Charles (February 22-24). Let us know if you’d like to help out; we can put to good use your volunteer presence and your donations.

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Do Not Be Fooled By Generic Concerta

Posted on January 1, 2013 by cchrstl

Happy New Year! Include CCHR Support in your New Year’s Resolutions!

On New Year’s Eve, Mallinckrodt, the pharmaceuticals business of Covidien in Hazelwood, Missouri (a city in St. Louis County), announced that it received approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to manufacture and market a generic version of CONCERTA® (methylphenidate hydrochloride) Extended-Release (ER) tablets.

Don’t be fooled; it will be called “Methylphenidate HCl ER Tablets” but it is still the same addictive and side-effect-laden central nervous system stimulant long marketed for the fraudulent disorder labeled ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) for people between 6 and 65 years of age.

Methylphenidate HCl is a stimulant drug, classified by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration as Schedule II, in the same class of highly addictive drugs as morphine, opium and cocaine. It is also known as Concerta LP, Concerta Oros, Daytrana, Equasym, Equasym XL, Metadate, Metadate CD, Metadate ER, Methylin, Methylin ER, Methylphenidate, Ritalin, Ritalin LA, and Ritalin SR.

These are some of the possible side effects:

  • Chronic abusive use can lead to marked tolerance and psychological dependence with varying degrees of abnormal behavior.
  • Frank psychotic episodes can occur.
  • Careful supervision is required during withdrawal since severe depression or other withdrawal symptoms may occur.
  • Serious adverse events, including sudden death, stroke and myocardial infarction, have been reported in patients taking usual doses.
  • Use of stimulants may cause treatment-emergent psychotic or manic symptoms in patients with no prior history.
  • Healthcare professionals should monitor for aggressive behavior.
  • Normal use may cause long-term suppression of growth.

There are 20 million children in the United States who have been diagnosed with some kind of psychiatric disorder and drugged for it. Child drugging has been a hugely profitable market for Big Pharma, earning them $4.8 billion dollars a year.

There are no genetic tests, no brain scans, blood tests, chemical imbalance tests or X-rays that can scientifically/medically prove that any psychiatric disorder is a medical condition.

There are many non-drug alternatives.

Find out! Fight back! Take action!

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Connecticut Shooting Wake Up Call

Posted on December 18, 2012 by cchrstl

Wake Up Call for Federal Investigation of America’s  Failed Mental Health System

In the coming days, as a nation, we will respectfully bow our heads for those brief moments of silence in remembrance of the victims of Newtown, CT. Then, with the same outrage expressed at the murderous act, the nation must rise up and demand a sweeping investigation behind all the possible causes, including the mental health system itself.

According to news reports, the Sandy Hook shooter, Adam Lanza, was a product of the mental health system and had been taking “medication” since the age of ten and reportedly seeing a psychiatrist from at least the age of 15.  Lanza’s mother reportedly told friends that Lanza “was getting worse” and “she was having trouble reaching him.” The questions that need to be answered is when did Adam Lanza first receive mental health treatment, what diagnoses did he receive and what drugs had he been prescribed over his short life.

The larger question is how many times does this senseless scenario have to play out before lawmakers finally acknowledge that the supporting data already exist and, to date, has repeatedly and deliberately been ignored. Between 1998 and 2012, fourteen school shootings occurred, taking the lives of 58 and wounding 109. All fourteen of those shooters were taking or withdrawing from a psychiatric drug and seven of them had been under the “care” of a psychiatrist or psychologist.

In other mass shootings, such as James Holmes, the suspected perpetrator of the July 20, 2012 mass shooting at a movie theatre in Aurora, Colorado, it is known that Holmes was seeing psychiatrist Lynne Fenton, yet no mention has been made of what psychiatric drugs he had been prescribed.

The majority of these shooters had been prescribed psychiatric mind-altering drugs that had not been approved by the Food and Drug Administration, FDA, for treatment of children under the age of 18. Yet, antidepressants are at the top of the list of drugs indicted in these shootings, including Prozac, Trazodone, Effexor, Celexa and Luvox, to name a few.

Click here now to read the rest of this article.

Sign the Petition for Federal Investigation into the relationship between school shootings and psychiatric drugs.

 

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Drugging our Troops

Posted on December 16, 2012 by cchrstl

The Creation of Psychopharmaceutical’s Multi-Billion Dollar Market

CCHR International announces the third in a four-part series by award-winning investigative journalist Kelly Patricia O’Meara exploring the epidemic of suicides and sudden deaths in the military and the skyrocketing use of psychiatric drugs being prescribed to soldiers and veterans.

In the third installment, O’Meara examines the history of the psychiatric-military alliance and how psychiatry has created a multi-billion dollar market for military psychiatrists and big pharma.

As has been well documented in the first two parts of this investigative series, the military is at a mental health crossroad. Soldiers are dying by suicide and other sudden unexplained deaths at record—even epidemic—levels; an epidemic that seems to have been spawned by nearly $2 billion the Department of Defense (DoD) and Veterans Affairs (VA) have spent on antipsychotics and anti-anxiety drugs, despite international drug regulatory warnings of mania, psychosis, suicide and death. Even according to DoD’s own policy, “Guidance for Deployment-Limiting Psychiatric Conditions and Medications,” antipsychotics like Seroquel are disqualifiers for deployment.

Given that under the advice of mental health professionals suicides and other unexplained deaths still are increasing, why does Command continue to listen to what, for all practical purposes, appears to have miserably failed? Despite the fact that since 2009, mental health staffing has doubled in Afghanistan and a mental health survey of deployed troops found that stress levels among Service members in Afghanistan nearly tripled between 2005 and 2010.

Click here to read the full article now.

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