Posted on 04/27/2014 6:42:26 PM PDT by ilovesarah2012
The National Health Interview Survey (NHIS), implemented by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) have released a report detailing how an estimated 7.5% of US children ages 6 to 17 are currently prescribed psychotropic mood stabilizers for alleged emotional or behavioral problems.
This translates to 1 in 13 school-aged children in the US are taking at least one major pharmaceutical on the basis that their behavior is not appropriate and necessities medical attention.
Data concerning 2011 and 2012 from 17,000 children was provided to the NHIS for this study.
It was shown in the study that white, non-Hispanic; males were most likely to have a diagnosis of a behavioral disorder, while 4.0% of older female children were being prescribed psychotropic drugs.
Those children on Medicaid or CHIP coverage were 9.9% more likely to have prescribed medications than those who came from families that could afford private health insurance.
LaJeana Howie, statistical researcher for the NCHS commented : “We can’t advise parents on what they should do, but I think it’s positive that over half of parents reported that medications helped ‘a lot,’”
The intimation by the researchers is that attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is represented as the majority of diagnosis; which would validate the argument that ADHD is over-diagnosed and as a result the children are over-medicated for issues that may not necessarily pertain to them.
In fact, 9.2% of impoverished children were prescribed psychotropic drugs where the household income was at 100 – 200% of the poverty line.
Shockingly, it was also shown how the parents’ perception of their children’s behavior great determined whether or not the child would be forced to take drugs to control their moods.
(Excerpt) Read more at occupycorporatism.com ...
The only drug my offspring get that controls mood is sugar.
Parents sometimes push this on their children to help get “crazy money” S.S.I.
That happens to be my mood altering substance of choice too.
Ummmmm.......because Medicare and ObamaCare pick up the cost for these kid’s “free” drugs and pass the cost to the taxpayer?
“As with adults, most child applicants are denied SSI, and only those with medically documented impairment that results in “marked and severe functional limitations” qualify for benefits. Just 1.7 percent of U.S. children receive SSI—fewer than 1 in 4 U.S. children with disabilities. Contrary to misconceptions, doing poorly in school is not a basis for SSI eligibility. Poor performance in school may be an indicator of a learning disorder or other mental impairment, but on its own is not sufficient to qualify a child for SSI. Likewise, doing well in school doesn’t mean a child will lose benefits. Academic performance is just one evidentiary factor among many considered in evaluating a child’s eligibility for SSI.”
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/donna-meltzer/social-security-disability-programs_b_3014961.html
Very, very interesting, ilovesarah2012. Thanks for posting.
It brings back memories of a conversation with a co-worker 15+ years ago when her daughter decided to put her son (the grandson of co-worker I knew) on ritalin.
Or were you just commenting generally and not neccesairly addressing my reply?
Huffington Post? Anything from there is liberal by nature or it wouldn't be there.
The author of this article needs to go back to journalism school. Beyond the fact that a lot of kids are being drugged, I can’t quite tell what exactly is going on.
I’m only speaking directly about two children I know personally. My wife’s sister has two G/children who receive an S.S.I. check of $730 per month each and their only diagnosis is A.D.D., for which they are prescribed medication that makes them little zombie boys and affects their appetites. It’s hard to get them to eat when they are on their dope. Sad, all for money.
($730 or $630, I forget which)
When I went to school I was not particularly ‘bright’. We had some financial problems at home. My father had to quit school when he was only 10 to go to work during the depression and had to continue on that way so without a hs diploma he had to work in the workforce as some kind of blue collar worker, as it was he was intelligent and became a scheduler planner. In todays world I’m not sure this could even happen.
So we had all these problems with money, as there were 4 kids and my parents were struggling, but we did it, however my father yelled a lot, being so stressed I suppose. He was a good guy.
I suppose today they would pop me on drugs right away. I must have had a ‘learning disability’.
It happens I took an IQ test only a few years ago, mine is 135.
This title really bugs me. I don’t think big pharma is innocent 100% of the time, but big pharma had products on the market for decades before children were routinely prescribed the meds for mood alteration.
So is this big pharma today, or is it the out of control run-away Leftists trying to socially engineer the next generation?
I would say it’s the Leftists trying to social engineer the next generation.
I’m not here to say that no children benefit from these medications. I am here to say I think they are way over-prescribed.
I’m not a physician or a pharmacist, but somehow kids got through the 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s without these sorts of meds. Pray tell how, if kids can’t get through life without them now?
Some friends of ours had a developmentally disabled son and his behavior was awful! Most of it really was bad parenting and they had a Dr. who put him on Ritalin. OMG! It made him into a zombie.
Anyhow, they were good enough parents to realize that they preferred not to have a zombie in their family, they found a very good faith-based psychiatrist and they learned to deal with him.
Further, while her inflammatory and false headline suggests bias against lower class children, she then blithely cites data showing white males are the most frequent recipients. Sorry, this lunatic woman is a waste.
Next time find something worth repeating.
Charles Bradley, M.D., 1902–1979In 1937, Charles Bradley noted that 14 of 30 children with behavior problems showed a "spectacular change in behavior.remarkably improved school performance" during 1 week of treatment with benzedrine R1557211. His subsequent research and that of others established the benefit of psychostimulants in the treatment of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Bradley's 1937 observation now stands among the most important psychiatric treatment discoveries.
I'm not endorsing the protocol but the author didn't make it up.
$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
Yes. She meant "Benzedrine."
She offers no support for her contention that big pharma is responsible for the overprescription of drugs to control ADHD in young, poor kids.
Here's an explanation that a leftist journalist will never consider: Such kids are far more likely than average to live with a young single mother, who can't handle the strain of active children, especially extremely active boys. She insists that her doctor DO SOMETHING ABOUT THIS PROBLEM CHILD. Writing a prescription is easy for the doctor, and from the mother's perspective, it works: a drugged child is easier to manage.
That explanation cannot be considered by leftists, because its villains are members of an official victim group: single mothers. As usual, the left ignores reality so that a politically correct oppressor can be blamed.
My boss has a daughter who is 27. She has a 3 year old son and his separated and lives with her parents (my boss and her husband). She has bipolar and a bunch of other mental issues. Pretty much - she’s nuts. She doesn’t work, though she has in the past. They applied for disability for her but she was denied, as she should have been. She is a nut but perfectly capable of working, as she has in the past.
I never knew anyone growing up who was “bipolar”. These days it’s as common as having blue eyes. Why? I admit I have no idea. But a lot of people who get disability certainly aren’t disabled.
We are a classless nation. Lower "economic status", maybe. Being someone who has raised myself and family from a lower economic status to a higher economic status, I am proud of our nation for that. Only the left divides us into "classes".
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