The Prozac Problem

Few drugs have received faster acclaim and recognition than 1 Ritalin and Prozac. Although they should be prescribed for different "conditions," often they seem to cross. As you may have read in my article last month, Ritalin is used to "treat" the condition of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in children, while Prozac is widely applied to conditions like depression.

The frightening fact is that the pharmaceutical industry has found a brand-new lucrative market for Prozac your children. Even more frightening is that this market is now being expanded to infants and toddlers. It is being sold to you, the parent, as health care! Nothing could be further from the truth.

"The public might be shocked to learn that the vast majority of studies for FDA [Food and Drug Administration] approval of psychiatric drugs such as Prozac show them to be of no value whatsoever," says Peter Breggin, MD, director of the International Centre for the Study of Psychiatry and Psychology.

"The drug company is allowed to pick out two often marginally or questionably successful studies as proof that the drugs work," says Breggin.

In a 1999 study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), the authors surveyed physicians who regularly prescribe specific serotonin re-uptake inhibitors (SSRIs) to children under 18. The FDA has not approved inhibitors like Prozac for this segment of the population. It was found that 72 percent of physicians prescribe such drugs to children, but only 16 percent feel comfortable doing so. Only eight per cent feel qualified.

Seven to nine million North American children from kindergarten to grade 12 are on psychotropic drugs (drugs that affect mood); five to six million are on Ritalin or other amphetamines; and one to two million kids are on drugs like Prozac, Luvox, tricyclic antidepressants, Cylert and cloni-dine. (The last two drugs have even been linked to liver failure, cardiac arrest and death in children.)

This is not OK!

Why is Prozac such a problem? You may be surprised to hear that it has been associated with aggressive and violent behavior. A recent issue of Lancet, a major scientific journal, found that Prozac has been associated with increased rate of seizures, convulsions, paranoid psychosis and suicide. Not pleasant side-effects! The children involved in the shootings you have read about in high schools have been on Prozac or other psychotropic drugs.

Why is This Happening?

Parents are told that their children have a "chemical imbalance" in the brain and need these "chemical balancers" to be healthy.

Noted child neurologist Dr. Fred Baughman is outraged at the psychiatry profession. He says they work for the pharmaceutical industry to promote legal drug trafficking. The ADHD "diagnosis," for example, is fraudulent and only exists so that normal children can be placed on addictive psychotropic drugs for the sake of profit.

Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, conduct disorder, oppositional defiant disorder, severe emotional disability, learning disabilities and every single psychiatric "disorder" those that are represented as diseases due to chemical imbalance in the brain are not diseases at all.

"They are the stuff of labelling, drugging and billing," says Baughman. "It is that simple, that unimaginable, that heinous."

Baughman wrote in the JAMA, April 28,1999 that once children are labelled with ADHD, they are no longer treated as normal. Further, the action of a psychotropic drug in the brain and body causes physical, neurological and biological abnormalities.

Here are some suggestions that you may find helpful:

1. Talk with your children. I find that open dialogue is a wonderful way of defusing a potentially explosive situation.
2. Spend time with your children. Peter Breggin feels that much of ADHD can be relabelled as DADD, Dad Attention Deficit Disorder.
3. Talk with your friends and support groups. You are not alone.
4. See a pediatric chiropractor. Often a vertebral subluxation (partial dislocation of a backbone joint) caused by the process of birth can affect the nervous system of your child and alter his reality and behavior.
5. Do not allow your child to be labelled. Often children and their parents tend to live up to that expectation.
6. Obtain as many opinions as needed. You'll find a wide variety-this is actually beneficial.
7. Get a hair analysis performed for toxic heavy metals.
8. Heavy metals can often cause altered behavior.
9. Children should have a healthy diet rich with organic fruits and vegetables, devoid of pesticides and chemical additives.
10. The following nutritional supplements are helpful and are available at your local health food store:

• Vitamin B-complex, B₃, B₅ and B₆ have been linked to brain activity and normal neurological function. When taken with vitamin C, the B group enhances the body's ability to handle stress.
• Gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) is an amino acid with a calming, tranquilizing effect.
• Valerian root extract also has a naturally calming effect on the nervous system.